White Snake
by IveHeardItBothWays1088
Summary: Hiashi wants nothing to do with Hinata and she ends up as Anko's apprentice. She'll have to learn to be strong to survive in the world of Shinobi. Epic of Hinata becoming one of the most powerful nin of her generation. Strong Hina. AU. R&R Please!
1. I want her, give her to me

**A/N:** I don't own Naruto, otherwise Jiraiya would still be alive. That sucked.

This is my fic, synopsis would be this: Hinata is taken under the wing of one Mitarashi Anko. Watch her as she blossoms into more than just about anyone expected. Pairings possible Naruto, but nothing set in stone. Pairings would be coming way, way later.

This is Hina-centric big time. In this fic Naruto is not really a big factor for her, for reasons that will be explained later. They might pair but Hina needs to be developed, so he will not come along until way later in the story.

I hope you enjoy. This chapter is short, so forgive that. I don't plan on making chapters of this length too often.

Any deviations from cannon please take it in stride, though I don't think there will be many. Still, this is fanfiction you know P

(A/N: I'm reposting this story. This story was originally under the name White Snake by the author ThreeJewels. Well, ThreeJewels is me! :D. But due to some problems with my hotmail account linked to that screen name, I've had to completely abandon that name. I'm going to be reposting the story so far bit by bit and hopefully continue it. For those of you who liked the story and have not had an update in years, I want to say thank you for reviewing, liking, and reading the story. I feel a good ammount of time has passed and I've re-discovered my fan fiction muse. Thank you all very much =]. I hope you keep reading! And to any new readers... I hope you enjoy the story. IMO when re-reading it it could use some polishing. But plenty of people seemed to like it, so I hope anyone new will too).

000

Kurenai sat in Mihoi Café early in the morning, sharing an early morning breakfast with one of the more unusual Jounin in all of Konoha (as far as she could tell only second to their green spandex-clad counterpart). Yuhi Kurenai couldn't help but frown at the choice of drink her friend had so early in the morning.

"You know Anko, sake is not typically considered a breakfast drink" she said as she drank her own tea. They had come here to have a Western breakfast, as they usually did once a month just to keep track of each other. They had been friends for a long time, though Kurenai sometimes wondered how she had lasted as the eccentric and violent woman's friend for so long. Something about her own great capacity for patience, she mused.

Mitarashi Anko drank her cup of sake in basically one shot, and then moved to refill it. "You know Yuhi, we hardly get to go drinking anymore," she said with a sly smile as she raised the cup to her lips. "You can't blame me for trying to make up for the time we miss together. And what does the time of day have to do with anything, mind you?" she asked in an innocent and teasing voice.

Kurenai shook her head, knowing it was pointless to argue with the woman. If she wanted to drink at eight in the morning, that was her business, thought Kurenai could not help but worry some for the friend. She wondered if it was the same issue that had always been with her that had her drinking early in the morning, or if she was just doing something crazy like she tended to do for no reason. Either way, the mood was light and now was not the time for such an inquiry.

They made small talk, Anko becoming overly excited and exclaiming loudly when some Western breakfast delicacy called a crepe was put before them.

"Hey, old man, whip us up an order of dango while you're here will you?" Anko said to the waiter turning to look at him.

The man frowned, he couldn't have been older than forty, and said with some stiffness in his voice, "I'm sorry ma'am, but we do not serve that kind of food on the breakfast menu…"

Anko's hand moved lighting fast to her head, as if she was going to scratch an itch on the back of her neck. The motion however caused a kunai to fly out of her sleeve and passing within an inch of the man's neck, imbedding itself on a wood column ten feet behind him. The man froze and looked around, then back to the women again, a frightened look on his face as he realized what had just happened.

"Oops, sorry! I forget I keep that in there sometimes," said Anko with a not so convincing self deprecating laugh. "Now," she said, pulling another kunai out of somewhere and casually cleaning her fingernails with the tip, "I know turning an oven on and making some pre-prepared dango would't be too much trouble, now would it? I mean, most people usually make it a point to try and keep shinobi happy. Can't imagine why that would be, though" she said, keeping her voice neutral in a way that was not neutral, and made it sound much more like a veiled threat.

The man only nodded, accenting that he would take care of it, and quickly made off in the other direction. Before he was all the way gone, Anko thought of something else, turned and yelled at the almost-running man "Hey and another bottle of sake while you're at it, old man!"

Kurenai shook her head. "You shouldn't do that to civilians Anko. Intimidating the general population could elicit disciplinary action and a black mark on your record from the Hokage's office. If the waiter or the restaurant owner decided to make an issue out of it Sarutobi would be taking it out of your hide for a month."

Anko just shrugged and crossed her legs casually in a very feminine manner. Kurnai was always wondered how the younger Jounin could be such a tomboy one second and seem so feminine and sultry the moment after. She guessed that was at least one of the reasons why the woman was never short on male company when she wanted it. That the woman made it clear what she wanted from a man in the first minute was probably an attractive factor for the opposite sex as well.

Kurenai chose her words carefully, "you know he wasn't refusing out of personal dislike. Not everyone in this town dislikes you you know."

Anko just shrugged again. "It's my style. He won't go reporting to the Hokage. Most people are too afraid of what I might do to them," then she gave her friend a savage smile, "if they really believe the crap they say about me then they should be smart enough not to go out of their way to make me irritated, otherwise who knows what could happen?" Anko sat back, smiling like a cat and feeling smug. Kurenai just shook her head. The woman went about these things the wrong way, even discounting her abrasive personality and her…strange behaviors. She sadly wondered if the woman had given up trying to be accepted by the general population.

They both turned to their forgotten crapes and started to eat in earnest, and soon along came the waiter with freshly made dango and a hot bottle of sake. He dropped them off and scurried away quickly. Anko offered her some dango, a rare and for the few who knew her a profound sign of trust and friendship, and gladly Kurenai took a couple while Anko consumed over a dozen to finish the plate. Kurenai would have been impressed if she did not know this was like a dango appetizer to the woman. She had personally seen her consume over a hundred and still ask for more. Where the woman put all of that inside her body Kurenai did not know.

When they were done eating and Kurenai sipped her tea while Anko drank her sake, the younger woman asked, "so, what are you up to this morning? I heard you're getting your first genin team. You won't pick them up until later in the morning though. Don't go easy on the brats by the way. So what is it that you have to do so early in the morning?"

Kurenai hesitated before answering, thinking there was no real harm in telling her friend. "Well, as it turns out one of my students is the heiress to the Hyuuga clan," this got a raised eyebrow and a curious look from her friend, "and apparently her father wants to talk to me. It's not common for the Hyuuga to allow their heirs to join a genin team and serve as regular active duty shinobi, but it's not the first time it's ever happened. But I'm not sure why he requested a meeting with me before the teams have even convened. I suppose it might be to request something for his daughter's safety, though he knows I cannot show any favoritism. So I'm not sure what his game it."

Anko thought about this for a minute, playing with a dango stick hanging out of her mouth. Then she smiled sweetly at her friend, "Can I come with, big sister Kurenai? I'm curious to see what the heir to the _famous_Hyuuga clan is like."

"Anko…" began Kurenai in a warning tone, "you're not exactly popular with the Hyuuga's. They still hold a grudge about what you did you know. You won't exactly get a warm greeting. And what are you planning to do, slip a large viper into Hinata's room? Or Hiashi-sama's study? It's not really in your interests of self preservation to go pissing off the Hyuugas," she paused for a minute, "even if you might be entitled to it to some extent."

Anko gave the older Jounin a puppy eye look that Kurenai knew was completely fake, even if it was somewhat convincing.

"No" said the older woman.

"Kurenai," said the younger woman in a oh too sweet voice, with a mischievous and dangerous glint to her eye, "you want me to come."

"No," said the red-eyed woman firmly, looking her friend in the eye. " I don't. It won't do anything but cause more problems. I don't really want to have to deal with a bunch of pissy Hyuuga's."

"I'll behave, Kurenai" said the younger woman with a teasing playfulness to her voice.

Kurenai rolled her eyes. Her friend would not drop the subject until she got what she wanted, she knew from painful experience. This was one of the pains of being friends with such a headstrong woman. Maybe it would just be less painful to let her come, but just make sure she was kept well out of anyone's way. She would get a headache if she had to sit here and argue about this for the next half hour. That decided it for her.

"Fine. But if you want to come you will have to wait while I speak with Hiashi-sama. And if you cause any problems I'll ask Hokage-sama to ban you from all dango serving restaurants in Konoha for a month."

The scowl her friend gave her was divine, that was not a price she was willing to pay to ruffle the skirts of some Hyuuga's. "Fine," she said, leaning back on her chair and stretching her arms overhead, "have it your way."

Kurenai gave her friend a tight smile. "Let's go then."

000

It wasn't nearly as entertaining coming into the Hyuuga compound as she thought it was going to be, given the circumstances. The two gate sentries were from the branch family, and in their early twenties or late teens did not seem to know who she was. A servant had led them through the large house until they were outside the study of the clan leader, Hiashi, who Anko, despite all the resentment between her and the clan, had never met personally. They never came across or saw another Hyuuga during the whole time they were walking through the estate. It was really uneventful. She was hoping to run into an elder or something, and get some kind of amusing reaction. Sadly, she had promised Kurenai she would be on her best behavior, so she couldn't take the initiative with some "entertainment".

The servant bowed politely to them. "Hiashi-sama is expecting you, Kurenai-san. If you could please go inside and wait, Hiashi-sama will be with you in just a minute." Anko noticed how she had just been politely told_she_ wasn't welcome in Hiashi-sama's study. Maybe the servant knew who she was. The grey haired servant certainly seemed old enough. But she doubted it. It was probably just how the anal retentive Hyuuga did things, since the servant had not been told to expect her.

"Thank you, my friend will wait for me out here then." Said Kurenai politely, shooting her friend a meaningful _don't_ _you dare do anything_ look. Anko just smiled at her, something that could either mean she agreed or that she was going to raise hell anyway. Kurenai just shook her head and walked in the study.

Anko had nothing to do but wait in the hallway as the servant left. As the minutes dragged on, she began to get a little restless.

_Man, I can't do anything fun to these stuck up pansies, and now I just have to stand here waiting. Maybe it was a bad idea to come after all. Maybe if I only let a few snakes go out and play, Kurenai couldn't get too mad about that…_

Eventually from the other room, she heard a door open. Anko smiled. Well, at least she would be able to eavesdrop on whatever Hiashi wanted to talk to Kurenai about. This was considered to be intimately rude, in traditional houses with paper walls people were supposed to pretend like they couldn't hear anything through the walls. It was a nice way to try to maintain privacy, but when someone wanted to listen to you, well, you had better whisper or any half-assed genin or even a civilian might be able to listen in to what you were saying. It gave her a kind of childish satisfaction to be able to rudely eavesdrop on the clan's leader.

Inside, they began, Anko rapt in attention.

"Kurenai-san," began a deep, stern male voice. Anko thought it sounded like the owner of the voice must have had a complete and utter stick up his ass. It clearly had to be Hiashi. This Hyuuga must be a real piece of work, she thought. It was hard to put that much pompous and self importance into a simple greeting.

"Hiashi-sama," replied Kurenai from the other side.

"I've called you here to speak about my daughter. I understand she will be assigned to your team." Anko wanted to gag. The way the man said _your team_was polite enough but dripped with what he thought about what her team would be. He probably thought they would be miles beneath his clan because they would be genin and most likely not from a prestigious house. Typical.

"That is correct, Hinata has been assigned to my team."

There was a pause, and then Hiashi began again, "Kurenai-san, I will get right to the point. Hinata is a failure. She does not have what it takes to lead this clan, she is weak. Because she is so weak and _pathetic_," he said the last with an angry and bitter tone, "she is being given over to you, to become a genin of Konoha, where hopefully the Hokage might find at least _some_ use for her."

Anko was privately a little bit surprised at the man. She had never heard anyone display such open contempt and dislike when talking to somebody else about their own child. The Special Jounin knew the Hyuuga's were a bunch of self-important assholes, but this man Hiashi seemed to be on a league of his own.

"Hiashi-sama, perhaps…" began Kurenai in a concerned tone. Anko couldn't figure out why that was, but kept on listening.

"No Kurenai-san, this is the way it has to be" the man said sternly. "The truth is her younger sister, _five_ years her junior, beats her handily in every match they have. It is clear to me which of my daughters needs to be groomed as clan head. I wash my hands of my eldest daughter, and will not waste any more time with her. She is yours and the Hokage's to use as you see fit. If she is killed in a mission, I will not care."

He paused for a minute, then added, "However, there is one request I should make. She is my daughter, and it would be shameful to the clan name if my daughter were to fight using anything other than our own Juken. While you can teach her _other_" he said in a way that made it clear he thought whatever it was would obviously inferior to theirs, "skills, I would like her main fighting techniques to remain the Juken. Is that clear?"

There was a pause, and then Kurenai's voice, "Hai, Hiashi-sama."

"Well then Kurenai-san. We are done here."

A few seconds after she heard a door close, presumably Hiashi leaving the study. A few seconds later, Kurenai opened the door to the hall and walked through. She looked a little bit ill to Anko's eyes.

As they were walking for the exit, neither one of them said a word, Anko with her hands in her coat and Kurenai seeming to be deep in thought. Eventually they found their way back to the entrance (Shinobi have good memories about things like this) and left the Hyuuga compound.

Eventually, growing a little uncomfortable with the silence, Anko said to her friend, "That Hyuuga is a real piece of work. Wouldn't want to be born into that kind of a family. I hope the daughter wasn't anywhere in the whole house, it would suck if she ever heard a third of what her dear otousan said about her. The poor girl might be scarred for life" she said, a little smile playing on her lips. Little things like thinking about scarring someone for life tended to amuse her.

Kurenai, however, had grown pale, and visibly retracted further into her own thoughts when she made that comment.

Anko noticed and frowned at this. "What?"

Kurenai looked up at the sky, a sad look on her face. "Hiashi-sama brought Hinata in with him when he came to talk to me."

Anko gaped at her friend. She had to be kidding. Anko knew she herself was a bitch, and really enjoyed making people miserable and hurting them on occasion, but she was never deliberately _cruel_ to anyone without good reason. And saying all that stuff in front of his own _child_. For the first time in a long time, Anko felt a real pang of sorrow. For this little girl Hinata who she had never met. She also felt a fresh wave of anger at the Hyuuga clan, as hot again today as it had been all those years ago.

"How could that fucking asshole do that?" she said, more to herself than to her friend.

"Beats the hell out of me," replied Kurenai in what was little more than a whisper, obviously having the same feelings for this girl as Anko was having. Maybe more so, Anko mused, since her friend was much more used to feeling for other people than she was.

And all of a sudden, Anko made an impulsive decision. "Give her to me."

Kurenai turned to look at her friend, genuinely surprised. "What? What do you mean give her to you?"

"Give her to me. She's going to need help if she's going to show that asshole father and that whole stupid clan they made a mistake by kicking her out like yesterday's trash. I'm going to train her. It's not like a genin like her is going to get many opportunities for individual training from a Jounin anyway. She'll need that if she is going to succeed."

"Wha-.. what? Anko, where did this come from?" her friend asked incredulously, "you don't even _like_ kids. And you've never shown any interest in teaching anyone anything before. Why this now? And what do you care if she shows her father he made a mistake?"

Anko lifted one eyebrow up at her friend. "So? Is what I'm doing really that far out of the ordinary?"

They continued walking in silence for a few seconds. Then Kurenai cracked a smile, and said, "You feel sorry for her, don't you?"

Anko shrugged, "maybe a little." Kurenai was surprised by this response, and smiled. She completely expected her friend to deny it vehemently and get to tease her about it a little bit. With the younger woman, what she had just said translated as "this story is breaking my heart" or something equally cliché and overused as that. That sentiment was not something you often got from the Special Jounin.

As she thought about it, Kurenai suspected that at least in part the other woman was this interested in Hinata's situation because, at least in some ways, it probably reminded her of when someone who had been like a father to her had done something close to the same thing. But Kurenai wasn't about to say that outloud. She didn't feel like dodging kunai.

"Come on Kurenai," the other woman began, "you know she's going to be a mess. If that is the kind of abuse she goes through, the girl probably really believes all the crap her father tells her, that she's worthless, useless, weak, all that stuff. She's going to need to get her confidence up to speed before she can even make a half decent genin. Can you really give her the attention she needs while trying to put together a team?"

Kurenai thought about it. _Maybe_ Anko had some good points. But still… "you just want her for yourself, don't you? Want to shape her your own little way?" she said, with more bite than she was usually used in her conversations, but staying from being hostile, "You know the Hyuuga's will have a stroke when they find out who has been training their heir… or rather ex-heir, though being the eldest child still gives her prestige within the clan. You're just looking for the outrage and to rub something in the Hyuuga's face, aren't you?"

Anko grinned, "yes, I admit that is a small part of it. But," she said seriously, "I think it will be good for the girl. You know that in the long term apprenticing her to train with me will probably be what is best for her. Don't be selfish Kurenai, I can tell you want to groom and help this girl yourself, you always were the 'save the kicked puppy' sort. But with a team to take care of you'll only be able to do a half-assed job at best."

Kurenai sighed. It was true that she would rather take the girl on and try to help her herself. In a team setting thought, where she could not take any more time with one student than the others, at least in theory, it would probably take a very long time for her to have the effect she needed to really make the girl into a confident and competent shinobi. Besides, as a Hyuuga, if it turned out the girl still _did_ want to earn the approval of her father and her clan (Kurenai thought the girl should just forget about that, but family ties were never that easily severed), letting Anko become her main teacher would be the fastest way to accomplish that.

"Fine," said the red-eyed Jounin, "tomorrow I meet Hinata and her team, and I'll get a feel for her and the rest of them. If it looks like it is what is best for her, I will turn her over to you."

A smile split Anko's face. "Really, Kurenai-sempai?" she said in a teasing voice, harkening back to their earlier days as Leaf nin.

"Yes… but Anko, if you kill this girl, I swear we won't be friends anymore" she said to her friend, half joking and half serious.

"Don't worry Kurenai-sempai," said Anko happily, "I would never do anything to end the life of a student of mine. If she's quick I'm sure for the most part she'll be able to avoid most life threatening injuries."


	2. I trust you with your life

Kurenai stood in a small clearing in the middle of the forest in the middle of what was training ground 11. She liked these grounds best of all because they were almost completely wooded, ideal for training to work in the dense forests that surrounded Konoha and that covered most of the Land of Fire. It was where her sensei had taken her and her team when they were genin.

In front of her were her new charges. The three stood in front of her, Kiba looking bored and tapping his feet, seemingly impatient. Hinata, not surprisingly she thought sadly, was looking down at the floor self consciously and playing with the hem of her jacket. Shino just stood there stoically waiting, looking at her from behind those glasses.

An Aburame, a Hyuuga and an Inuzuka. She had to admit this was unusual and that she should probably consider herself lucky to get such a team. Here were three juniors from what were some of the most prestigious families in Konoha. Not only that, but they had talents that complimented each other. She knew that part of the reason this team had been selected was to construct a team that specialized in scouting and reconnaissance. This could be very valuable for the village, but also it was very dangerous, as they might expect to eventually be sent deep into enemy territory since they were to specialize in tracking, information gathering and avoiding detection.

Looking at her charges, especially the impatient and hyperactive Inuzuka and the painfully shy and unconfident Hinata, she could tell it might be a long time before they were anywhere close to doing anything that lofty. Getting them to work together would be the first step in the right direction.

Kurenai began, "Ok, as I have already told you my name is Yuhi Kurenai, and I will be your new sensei. Since we don't know each other why don't we start with some introductions? I will go first. My name you already know. I like kind people, my genuine friends, and I'm a great fan of music and the arts. I dislike cruel people, bigots, people who underestimate me because I am a woman, and overly salty foods. My dream is to become an even better Jounin for my students, and to one day soon begin an in depth research into genjutsu and genjutsu theory. Though I doubt I'll ever be a Sanin or anything of the like, I would love to one day reach that sort of level in genjutsu at least."

"Me next sensei!" said Kiba, "My name is Inuzuka Kiba and this here," he points at the dog on his head, "is Akamaru. I like my pack, spicy dishes and kicking people's butts with Akamaru. I dislike stuck up jerks, people who disrespect me and people who talk trash about those precious to me. My dream is to become a great ninja and master all the techniques of my clan. And oh yea to marry a real pretty girl who loves dogs one day."

Kurenai nodded, and signaled Shino to go next.

"My name is Aburame Shino. I like some things. I dislike those who kill insects for no reason. My dream is to breed a brand new strain of insects for my clan to utilize, and to become an asset as a shinobi to both my clan and the village."

Kurenai nodded, surprised he had said that much. It seemed like the boy did not like to talk much, and that was likely the most they would hear from him for a while. She turned to Hinata, "Ok, you next."

"Umm.." the young girl began, her gaze coming up and going back to the floor again after a quick look at the others present, "I like… um…p-people who are really nice and keep trying even when they keep getting put down by everyone… I um… I dislike mean people, and when people are angry… my d-d-dream is to have my father and my c-clan… other important people… acknowledge me… and to get stronger" She said the last part in a hardly audible whisper.

Kurenai frowned. Maybe Anko's assessment of the girl as needing serious work on her mental state was not far off base. She would definitely need a lot of remedial help with that body language and her apparent lack of any meaningful self confidence. As her Jounin, it was her responsibility to help her with this. But unless it was a special situation, she didn't really feel comfortable showing favoritism and spending a lot of extra time with one of her students if she was not going to do the same to all the others. It was also seriously frowned upon by the Hokage and the administration. But she could tell Hinata would greatly benefit from someone taking her under their wing.

Anko may not have been the best choice… but this girl, it had became clear to her in just a few minutes, did need some mentoring outside of what Kurenai could give her just in a team setting. That much was clear judging from her stammering responses, her body language and what she had actually said. Not to mention how her asshole of a father treated her.

Kurenai would do her best for her, without a doubt, and Kurenai suspected that if the girl got close to her teammates and began training with them on a regular basis she would gain some confidence. Still, as she was, Hinata did not have a bright future as a shinobi if she did not have a dramatic change in attitude and confidence. Anko was willing, though for what reasons was mostly mystery to the red eyed Jounin. She had some good guesses, and she wasn't sure any of those motivations were essentially the best. Kurenai mentally sighed. She had already said yes. Sure, why the hell not? It might also do some good for Anko, to have to spend time with such a nice, quiet, non-violent girl. She hoped the younger girl might rub off a little on the older one. She also quietly prayed that the older one wouldn't rub off too much on the younger one.

"Allright everyone, great introductions" began Kurenai, "We are now Team Eight, so that means we will need to work on working well as a unit. We will also be doing a great deal of training together, but as each of you has your own clans, a great deal of your training will be done at home. Now that you are out of the academy that doesn't mean that training gets easier, but instead it gets much harder. Is that clear to everyone?"

"Hell yea!" said Kiba with explosive enthusiasm, "we are going to train hard every day until we can kick anyone's ass, right Akamaru?" the small dog responded with a cute bark.

Shino just nodded, and Hinata politely nodded as well. So it was on.

She spent the first half of the morning sparring them, so she could get a sense of their abilities and they could start to get a sense of what each of them was capable of.

She limited them to taijutsu, and in that matchup Shino turned out to be the strongest of the three. When he and Kiba fought, the Inuzuka was much more wild in his moves and attacks, some of his moves no doubt learned from his clan. However, Shino's stances were much stronger, and Kiba could rarely get past his guard. In contrast, Shino attacked much less, instead waiting patiently for an opening and then hitting Kiba almost every time. By the end Kiba had many more scrapes and bruises that the bug user, and was also noticeably more winded, so after a small break she had Hinata pair up against the Aburame.

The match had been revealing, to say the least. Hinata activated her Byakugan and got into her Juken ready stance. At first Shino began to attack, and Hinata was able to parry all his blows with relative ease. She even managed to hit Shino's arms and shoulders a few times, closing some of his tenketsu points.

When Shino began to feel his arms going numb, he realized he couldn't take it easy on the girl and that he was at a serious disadvantage against her when it came to taijutsu. So he began to attack her all out, trying to use his superior size, his strong stances and superior strength to break through her guard, attacking much more aggressively. As soon as Shino started to go all out, Hinata seemed to falter. To her experienced eye, Kurenai could see that it wasn't necessarily that Hinata did not have the skill to deal with such an assault, but that when the bigger Shino started pushing her her concentration gave way, and she looked to Kurenai to be frankly intimidated by the bigger boy's aggressiveness and power.

After that the battle turned decidedly in Shino's favor, and he began to land many more hits than the young kunoichi did, though he was being considerate enough to pull his punches at the last second, hitting her with only a fraction of his real power. Though that was nice, Kurenai would have to talk to the boy and tell him to hit Hinata just a hard as he would hit Kiba. Enemy shinobi would not pull their punches against the girl, and he was not doing her any favors. Though for today she was glad Shino pulled his punches, otherwise Hinata would probably have disintegrated in her fighting even more.

After a break, it was Kiba and Hinata's turn. The fight, to Kurenai's disappointment, went much the same way as Hinata's previous one. At first it seemed like Hinata was holding Kiba and that she was the one in command of the fight. When Kiba realized taking it easy on the girl was going to lead to a swift defeat, he began to attack with renewed speed and ferocity, growling and making animal noises in battle in true Inuzuka fashion. At this point, Hinata's focus faltered, and it was plain to Kurenai that she was intimidated and mentally out of the fight when the intensity seem to ratchet up. Again, Kurenai was left with the impression that the girl just did not believe she could really handle herself in that situation. Her mind gave way long before her skills did.

Kurenai called for a break. After the fight was over, she ventured a look at Hinata. The girl was looking down at the ground, looking downcast and depressed. Kurenai's heart went out to the girl. Kurenai suspected that whenever the girl performed less than some arbitrary standard (most likely established in most part by her father's expectations) it just seemed to reinforce to the girl exactly what she thought was wrong with her. With just a few minutes of watching the Hyuuga heir (or ex-Hyuuga heir, thought the shift in title had not been made official yet), Kurenai's opinion of the Hyuuga clan went down at least a few stories. This girl needed support and encouragement, and she was willing to bet gold to lead that was the exact opposite of what she was getting.

As the two teammates walked back to where she and Shino were sitting, Shino surprised her by saying quietly, "you could have beat us both, Hinata." The other girl just nodded and seemed to shrink back a little in on herself, in a way that did not seem like she was too convinced about that but did not want to argue the point with the other boy. Kurenai was impressed at the observational powers and insight of the bug user, noticing that Hinata had the skills to beat them both but just lacked the mental fortitude to do so. Kurenai was reminded that she had three students, not one, and she dedicated herself to examining and learning as much as she could about her other charges as well.

After a break for lunch, and then some team building exercises, Kurenai dismissed them to go home, saying they would start on missions tomorrow and to meet here at field 11 at 9am. As Team 8 was leaving the training grounds, Kurenai spoke up,

"Hinata, can you stay behind for a bit? I want to talk to you about something."

Hinata looked back at her, seemingly a little worried about what her sensei would want to talk to her about. "Hai, Kurenai-sensei" she said.

Kurenai waited until her other two charges were out of earshot.

She looked at the girl in front of her. Hinata was fidgeting, unsure of what to do with herself, looking self consciously, or perhaps worriedly from side to side. What it was that made the girl so uncomfortable Kurenai couldn't be sure. Her hands were in the pockets of her jacket, and when that didn't seem to satisfy her she took her hands out of her pockets and started pressing her index fingers together in a nervous gesture. Kurenai sighed before she began.

"Hinata, I need to talk to you about your future."

"Hai." Said the girl in a small voice. Given what had transpired yesterday with her father, however, Kurenai couldn't blame the girl for being really uncomfortable with all this, or with feeling somewhat depressed today.

First off, Kurenai needed to find out what it was the girl wanted, what it was she was willing to do, before anything could be decided or anything could be done. So she began,

"Hinata, I know you said you want to become stronger. To earn the respect of your family" she didn't want to say father, being afraid she might say the word with some venom in her voice. "So, I take it you will not be trained by him anymore?"

Hinata seemed to shrink into the ground. "No sensei my father said he won't train me. He says I'm… he says its better if he spends time training my younger sister, Kurenai-sense."

She nodded. Kurenai had gathered as much from their meeting the day before, she just wanted to confirm whether Hinata had been told any differently in private. Then she asked, "so, is there anyone else in your clan who will train you then?"

To Kurenai's surprise, the young girl shook her head. "If otosan says he won't train me, then no one else in the clan is allowed to train me without his permission. H-He said he didn't want anyone wasting their time with me since… since I'm a failure." The girl was looking down at her feet, and seemed to look even smaller and more vulnerable now. Her eyes watered, and Kurenai saw the girl was trying bravely not to cry. She sniffed loudly, but to the girl's credit, not a single tear rolled down her face.

Feeling a lump in her throat, Kurenai asked kindly, "well, honey, if no one is allowed to train you how are you supposed to get stronger?" she remembered Hiashi-sama had said about wanting his daughter to fight like a Hyuuga.

Hinata swallowed a lump in her throat, but spoke in a more or less steady voice, "I already know the fundamentals of my family style, I just have to work to get better at them… if I was any good I could already… but I can't…" then a few tears really started falling down the girls face, and her sleeve went to her face to dry them off. After just a few moments the girl got her crying to stop, though she was still sniffly and her voice cracked a little, "I'm sorry, Kurenai-sensei" she said.

Inside, Kurenai was seething in rage at her family. What kind of a people could do this to a young girl? It was like she did not matter much at all outside of what abilities she could develop, or what she could do for the family name. But that was not the kind of attitude Hinata needed from her right now.

"Hinata," Kurenai began, "even if you already know what you are supposed to do, without someone supervising your training you won't get very far. Without someone there for you to guide you every step of the way, it's very unlikely you will get as good as you want to."

Hinata looked at her teacher, and the look in Hinata's eyes said the girl already knew that… that her father was condemning her to almost certain failure. Of course that wouldn't matter to him, Kurenai thought bitterly, since the man had already decided his eldest daughter was a failure and wanted only to make sure she didn't damage the Hyuuga family name. That this young girl had to live with that knowledge really wrenched at Kurenai's heart.

Still, she had to know what the girl wanted, what the girl was willing to do. Only then could she know if she could help her.

"Hinata, do you want to be strong?"

The girl looked down at the ground, and kicked the earth with her foot. "Yes" she muttered.

Kurenai frowned. That wasn't good enough.

"Hinata, look me in the eye."

The girl looked up at her, and met her eyes. Hinata's eyes were hurt, lost and just a little bit scared. Still, Kurenai had to know.

"Hinata, do you want to be strong?"

Hinata held her eye. And then she saw it. Behind all the hurt, confusion, fear and self doubt, she could see a little bit of steel in the girl's eye. It was small, but a bit of determination inside of her that had not been completely driven away by her father shone through and let itself be known. "Yes" the young Hyuuga said, voice still shaky, but still holding Kurenai's gaze.

Kurenai looked at the girl, and nodded. Good. You couldn't build something from nothing after all. And now she knew they had something they could build on with this girl.

"Hinata, me nor anyone else outside you clan can teach you to fight in the Hyuuga style. Only you or a member of your family can do that. And I can't train you in a conventional kunoichi way, I'm not really allowed to spend a lot of extra time training one of my students as opposed to the others unless it is under very special circumstances," Hinata nodded, looking disappointed but not like she hadn't been expecting something like it. That kind of attitude made Kurenai curse Hiashi in her mind again.

"However," she continued, and she could see Hinata perk up a little, and she was glad at least the girl still allowed herself to get her hopes up, even if just a little, "I do have a friend who is aware of your situation. She is willing to train you. In fact," she pulled her face close to Hinata and whispered conspiracitoriously, "she practically begged me to let her train you," At this Hinata's eyes went wide. It was nice to get such a reaction from her.

"She is a very, very good kunoichi," Kurenai said as she straightened up, "and as I said she seems to have taken a special interest in you," Hinata seemed about to ask why, but Kurenai held her hand up to silence the girl so she could continue, "but she will not be able to train you in your family style, any more than anyone outside your house could. Though I suspect she will integrate some of your family style's strengths in whatever training program she might assign for you,"

"But, you will be trained in a way of fighting and battle philosophy that I can guarantee will be much different than that of the Hyuuga clan. I can also guarantee that your training will be hard, demanding, and in some ways will seem insane and unduly dangerous," Hinata's eyes widened a little bit but the young girl said nothing, "and it will require a profound level of commitment. But, I can also guarantee that she can make you one hell of a kunoichi."

Kurenai stopped and crossed her arms as she looked at the girl, waiting for her to respond. She could not see her eyes because she had gone back to looking back at the ground. Eventually, Hinata said, "won't my father be mad about that? Even if I do become stronger, he will be displeased that it wasn't in the Hyuuga family style."

Kurenai felt like letting out a weary sigh, but instead she put a bit of steel in her voice to make her point, "I'm not going to lie to you Hinata. You father has set the stack against you, basically he has set you up to fail, and I don't like it one bit. You know this is true, I saw it in your eyes a little while ago," the girl lowered her head a little lower, and it was clearly a sign of shame and confirming what she had said, "so," Kurenai continued, "as I see it you only have two choices. Play by your father's game, your family's game, and almost certainly fail to meet their expectations using the Juken style and prove them right. Or you can seek strength your own way, with people that will support you, and then you can become strong enough to impress everyone in your family. Well then after that your father can complain all he wants about it being textbook Juken or not. But while they might not like what you have done, they will certainly respect you, your father will respect you, because if I know anything about the Hyuuga's is that they respect strength."

The girl did not move or change expression, but Kurenai could see the gears working in her brain. The girl looked very conflicted, and for good reason. This might be the very first time she was considering doing something that might displease her father.

The girl looked up at her teacher, hands together in front of her. "Ano… this friend of yours… why would she want to teach me?"

Kurenai shrugged, "I'm not sure myself" she answered honestly, " I guess you'll have to ask her yourself, if you want to know."

Hinata nodded, and took a deep breath. "Kurenai-sensei… I think I would like to receive training… even if it's not Juken style…" Hinata bowed deeply to her teacher, "Please, sensei! I would be honored to learn whatever your friend is willing to teach me!" She said in a rush.

Kurenai smiled. For some reason, she really liked this girl. "OK Hinata, this is how it's going to work. You will be with me and your team from 9 in the morning to noon, training. From noon until about four to seven, depending on the day, we will be taking care of whatever D-Ranked missions are assigned to us,"

"Your father gave you to my care, formally. So now I have to explain what all that means, though you probably know most of it by now. Though you are legally an adult, since you are part of a clan by clan law you are subject to the authority of whoever is in charge of you as far as training and mission goes until you are fifteen. You know this already. Your father gave that authority to me, and I will be giving that authority over to Anko if everything works out, so she will set your training and train you. However, as your Jounin, I also have a great deal of authority over you as far as what you do, when you do it, missions and things like that. On top of that your father also has authority over you. So in essence, it's a legal mess," she said, scratching the back of her head as she tried to sort it out, and failing, "but essentially we will be in charge of everything except your family life. Got it?" the younger girl nodded her understanding, though not looking entirely sure of what all this actually meant. Oh well, thought Kurenai, it's not a big deal unless something happens.

"So if it all works out, you will meet Anko at 5 in the morning," this elicited a bit of a widened stare by the girl, "everyday, and train until about eight. Then she might have you do another hour or two after we are done for the day, depending at what time we finish," the girl paled a little at hearing the training regimen.

"Are you sure you can handle that, Hinata-chan?"

"H-Hai.." said Hinata, though Kurenai could see the girl was not entirely sure if she was going to be able to handle it. Well, thought Kurenai, she would grow into it or she would not.

"One more thing Hinata. We will enforce this schedule if you decide you want to do this, and we will not ease up on it at all no matter how much you beg. However, tomorrow is going to be the first full day, and as such it is a trial day. If you go through tomorrow and decide that this isn't what you want to do, then come and tell me and I will understand. Anko will not train you, and you can just be a standard genin with your team, and I will do as much as I can to help you out."

The girl nodded. "Hai, thank you Kurenai-sensei."

Kurenai looked down at the girl for another second, then said, "by the way. The name of your new teacher is Mitarashi Anko. Meet her in field fourteen in the morning. I know her well, so believe me when I say that she will not really be trying to kill you… it probably will only feel that way. And… she's never really killed any innocent people, despite what you might think after spending some time with her." Kurenai felt really odd defending her friend in this way beforehand, but it seemed sensible that someone like Hinata should have a bit of a heads up ahead of time.

Hinata's mouth, in the meantime, had dropped open, "Umm.. Kurenai-sensei… are you sure it will be… you know… safe?"

She thought for a moment, then said, "Probably not, but you won't die, and she can definitely take you where you want to go. Just have a little faith, and it will be fine."

Hinata gulped, but just nodded.

Kurenai smiled. "OK then, I guess that's it. I'll see you tomorrow Hinata-chan"

Hinata gave her a small smile, and another deep bow, "see you tomorrow sensei."

Kurenai turned to leave, and then added one more thing. "Hinata, you… shouldn't mention Anko to your family. Some… things happened in the past and they don't like her very much because of it. In training, it's often best to keep what you are doing secret. It would be best if this whole thing was not known to your family, for your own good and the good of your training as well."

Hinata paused. "So…should I lie?" she said in an uncertain voice.

"No," replied Kurenai, "you should be a shinobi. See you tomorrow Hinata-chan."

And with that, Kurenai took off, leaving the young Hyuuga girl alone with her thoughts.

000

Hinata arrived at field fourteen with a few minutes to spare until the time she was supposed to meet her new sensei. She had always been a morning person, but getting herself out of bed at a bit past four in the morning was a bit much even for her. The girl yawned loudly and brought her hand up to cover her mouth. She wondered if she could handle this schedule every day she did not have a mission early in the morning. Hinata supposed she would get used to it, and with that sat next to an old, large tree.

The sky had that pre dawn glow that happened before the sun rose over the horizon. As she sat back she heard the world around her, hearing the rush of water through a small creek nearby, the birds waking and starting to chirp in the early morning dew, the rustle of the wind thought the leaves. She loved nature. She loved being outside, where she could be quiet and she could just be without anyone around to make her feel …well, she didn't want to dwell on that.

She was leaning back with her hands on the soft grass when she felt something cold and scaly going over her fingers. Hinata yelped in surprise and jumped to her feet, whirling around to see what had touched her.

There was a small green and yellow snake, very thin and about three feet long. Hinata looked at it curiously as it looked around, seemingly searching for something. She recognized it, part of their training had been to identify potentially dangerous wildlife. This was just a simple grass snake, not poisonous or dangerous at all.

The snake finally turned to her, and Hinata could have sworn it was looking right at her. Instead of turning and going away, it started heading towards her.

Hinata was surprised and puzzled by the boldness of the animal. When it got close she jumped to the side, landing a good eight feet away. The snake turned to face her and started slithering towards her again.

The young Hyuuga frowned, not sure why this snake seemed to be following her. When it got close she would jump away. It would then look around until it found her, and started slithering towards her again.

Hinata jumped away from the little snake a few more times, before realizing it didn't want to leave her alone. She thought for a moment, and then came to a decision. Sure, why not? It was harmless, just a little grass snake.

She crouched down and held her arm out as the snake approached her. When it reached her it slowed down and looked up at her curiously. The snake seemed to be at least somewhat intelligent in how it regarded her, and it made Hinata wonder all the more about the little snake.

After a few seconds, seemingly satisfied about something, the snake crawled up her arm. Through her jacket she could feel it's scales wrapping around her arm so it would not fall off. It felt kind of weird, and cold, but…nice. She giggled a little as the brightly colored snake crawled up her shoulder and tried to get close to her face.

Hinata moved her other hand in front of the snake and gently led it away from her face. It then started crawling onto her other arm. She held her arms up in fascination as she watched the snake entwined around one arm, and slithering itself onto the other. Hinata laughed in happiness and amusement. This was one of the neatest things that had ever happened to her.

She couldn't help herself, she knew it was silly but she started talking to the little snake in a quiet voice. "You're a good snake aren't you? Yes you are, of yes you are! I like you." She said to the snake, imitating some of the things she had heard Kiba say to his dog the day before when the boy had been playing with the him. She moved one finger to scratch it under its chin. To her surprise, the snake seemed to like it, moving its head and rubbing it against her finger. It made the smile on her face widen.

"You like snakes, do you?" she heard a playful voice come from above.

Hinata looked up, startled by the person suddenly sitting in a tree branch overhead. It was a young woman, maybe 24 or 25, with wild purple hair held in a pony tail that seemed to defy gravity behind her head. She had purple eyes that were just a shade lighter than her hair. The woman wore a short (very short!) tan mini skirt and a same colored trench coat that looked like it went all the way down to her ankles. She wore a (gasp!) fishnet bodysuit that ended about mid-thigh. The suit, she noticed with a blush, was sheer see through but somehow hid all the things it was supposed to hide around her chest area. To complete the outfit the woman wore metal shin guards above standard shinobi sandals.

The first thing Hinata thought was that this woman must have …_incredible_ … self confidence to go around dressed like that. The second thing she thought was that she wished she had that kind of confidence, but that immediately made her blush. No she didn't mean, you know, she wanted confidence, but not… no… not so she could dress like _that_!

The woman smirked at her, then jumped down from the tree to stand in front of her. She stood with her hands on her hips with an almost arrogant demeanor about her, a bit of a creepy mischievous grin on her face.

"Hinata, right?", began the woman, "I'm your new sensei."

Hinata stood back a little and bowed low to her new teacher, saying what she had planned to say to her, "thank you for taking me as your student, Mitarashi-sensei. I promise I will do my best!" the little snake squirmed in her hands a little.

Mitarashi looked at the young girl with an odd look on her face, then said with a dismissive wave, "don't be so formal, I really hate that kind of shit. Just call me Anko or sensei, that will be good enough for now."

"A-Ano…I'm sorry sensei…" said Hinata, suddenly a little nervous and feeling insecure at having already done something to displease her new teacher.

Anko raised an eyebrow and gave Hinata a small lopsided smile. "What are you apologizing for? There is no need to apologize for being _polite_. Damn silly girl."

"Uhm…sorry Anko-sensei…"

"What the hell are you apologizing for now?" said Anko, now clearly amused at the girl. "And I just told you, call me Anko _or_sensei, I don't want you calling me anything else stupid girl."

Hinata was starting to go into a state of mild panic. She had not even known her teacher for a full _minute_ yet and she was already screwing up. Like she always screwed up.

"…sensei, I'm s-s-sorry sensei, I didn't mean…"

"Stop!" Said Anko sharply. The young girl was starting to panic inside Anko could see. This was going to some serious work.

"Do you always apologize this much about everything Hinata-chan?" she asked in a much darker but still amused tone.

"Ano…I'm so-"

"STOP! Don't apologize to me, just answer the damn question!" said Anko with some anger in her voice (for theatric effect).

It seemed to work, because the girl seemed to shrink and collapse in on herself more, but she didn't start with another apology.

Hinata was wondering what she had done already to upset her new sensei…she didn't know. She felt she should have known, but she didn't. Part of her automatically attributed that to her being innately deficient in some way. There was always something about her that made her screw up, wasn't there?

Anko had been in the interrogation squad of ANBU and had learned to read people's faces and body language like an open book (thanks to Ibiki's fine tutelage). It was clear to her by seeing the emotions passing through Hinata's face that the girl was taking all the blame for her displeasure into herself, thinking it was all her fault. Anko suspected it was the same way in most things in her life, that somehow her father treating her like shit was entirely her fault.

Anko also knew from her extensive psychological training that if an individual thought they were intrinsically flawed, that undermined the whole mental structure of what it took to be a confident human being. Well, she had to show her somehow that she wasn't intrinsically pathetic, at least in one aspect of her life. That would open the door to confidence in all the other parts of her life.

The Special Jounin laughed a wicked laugh inside. She knew just how to do that. But first things first.

After a minute, seeing that Anko was still expecting an answer, Hinata replied honestly.

"Ermm.. yea.. I-I guess I do apologize a lot about things…" she stammered. She noticed she still had the small snake in her hands. She gently kneeled down and put it down in the glass. To her surprise, it slithered next to her foot, rolled itself up in concentric circles and just laid down next to her.

Anko noticed it but didn't say anything. Inside though she was pleased. If this little guy had taken a liking to her then things were going according to plan, for now.

The Special Jounin cleared her throat, and then swept her arm dramatically, as if making a royal pronouncement. "Well Hinata, your training starts right here, right now. From now on, under no circumstances are you to apologize to _anyone_ about _anything_. I don't care if it makes people angry or you feel like you've done something wrong. Off duty and on duty, you will not utter a single apology until I've cleared you to do so." Anko looked at her student dangerously, letting some of her killer intent leak out, "And I'm serious about this, Hina-chan. If you do apologize at any time I _will_ find out. And you will not like the 'corrective steps' I will take if you do, do I make myself clear?"

Hinata was shocked by this new rule set up by her new sensei, very intimidated by the woman's frightening killer intent (she didn't know this was only a small fraction of it), and very puzzled by this new rule. No apologizing? What did that have to do with training her to become a stronger shinobi? Did this woman really want to train her, or was she just… having a laugh at her expense?

Still, Kurenai-sensei trusted this woman and she didn't seem… bad, really. Even if a little odd. And Hinata really was determined to do her best to get stronger.

"Hai sensei… I will do what you ask" the young Hyuuga replied.

"Great!" said the older woman with a smile on her face, "I'm sure you won't let me down Hinata-chan."

The younger girl blushed a little at this, and nodded. But she had to ask, "Erm… sensei…? Wha-What does not apologizing have to do…with getting stronger?"

Anko smiled the smile of a serpent down at the younger girl. "Ask me again some other time, if I deem you _worthy_ of receiving the answer then I will give it to you."

The girl simply nodded, adverting her eyes from the older woman and looking down. She felt like she should apologize for some reason, but she wasn't sure why. She sighed. Well… she wasn't happy about this, not really in the least. She had been raised to be polite and that not having manners meant one was little more than some low-class wench or drunkard off the street. Hinata could not see the point, but she was determined to be dutiful and follow her Jounin sensei's instructions.

When the girl looked up, she found that her sensei was gone.

"Sensei…?"

"Over here" came Anko's voice from behind Hinata.

Hinata turned to see the woman standing about twenty feet from her. Before Hinata had turned all the way, the woman did a fast motion with her arm. It took Hinata a split second to realize that her sensei had thrown a kunai at her, faster than she had ever seen a kunai fly before. For some reason, the thought that it was her sensei, a Jounin, who had thrown the kunai, the highest of ninja made her freeze. Hinata did not react in time but stayed frozen as the kunai headed straight in between her eyes...

To Hinata's utter surprise and shock, the kunai stopped within an inch of her forehead. The girl had been so frozen she had not even closed her eyes. It seemed to hang in the air in front of her eyes for what seemed like a long time, when in reality it could not have been more than a fraction of a second. Then the kunai was yanked backwards, and it flew through the air back to its thrower.

Hinata looked closer, and she saw the reason she wasn't dead. Her new sensei had attached a strand of ninja wire attached to the ring on butt of the kunai. The young Hyuuga did not feel any emotion at all for the first few seconds after, Anko-sensei standing there holding the kunai with wire casually in her hand looking at her with an unreadable expression.

Then Hinata felt the first feeling from her brief would-be brink with death. Shame. Hinata hung her head and had to struggle not to cry. She was so pathetic. Here she was, a shinobi of the leaf, and she couldn't even move when a simple kunai was thrown her way. That she had been caught by surprise was no excuse. Her sensei had hardly even met her yet and Hinata had already shown her that she was pathetic. Hinata knew she wasn't any good, but she had hoped, _hoped_, that maybe she could keep that part of herself hidden long enough… to where the new teacher would give her a chance. Were she might… oh she didn't know what! Maybe she shouldn't even try, she was so patheric…

Hinata knew her new sensei probably wouldn't want to train her now. Maybe she had taken pity on her before, but by this display she would no doubt decide she would rather not waste her time, and Hinata could not blame her for it. She could just imagine what her father would say if he was here. Hinata imagined her new sensei would do a similar job of letting her know how much of a failure and a useless shinobi she was, as her father seemed to think she needed constant reminder. If she was lucky her new sensei would train her for a little while longer before deciding she wasn't worth it and ditching her. For some reason Hinata felt like barking a laugh. Not that it would be a surprise if her sensei did do that. Along with the traditional feelings of uselessness, shame and pain, there came a new feeling that Hinata was not used to: bitterness. It genuinely surprised her that she was feeling bitter for the first time she could remember as her mind went over the same kinds of thoughts she almost always had every time she trained with her father.

She looked over at her sensei, expecting her to have a displeased look on her face and to start listing her inadequacies at any moment. To her surprise, her sensei was standing casually with her arms crossed, a playful smirk playing on her face.

"You can do better than that. I know you can." Anko said to her. Hinata was surprised; this wasn't what she had been expe…

In the blink of an eye, the kunai was flying at her again, this time much faster than before, so fast it had turned into a blur. This time Hinata didn't think, her body just moved, her many years of shinobi training kicking in this time. She moved to the side and dropped the same knee on that side so her body would move out of the way faster, something you normally would never do but the blade came at her so fast she had no other choice. The girl felt a sharp pain as the kunai nicked her neck as it flew past her head, imbedding itself with a loud _thunk_in a tree behind her. The movement caused the young kunoichi to fall on the ground.

The young girl looked at her sensei wide-eyed, panting, and the older woman was just standing there grinning at her. She wasn't reaching for any more weapons though, and looked to be giving her a bit of time, so the young Hyuuga felt (somewhat) safe at the moment. Hinata turned her head to look at the kunai that had been thrown at her. It was there imbedded in a tree about twenty feet behind her, the ninja wire still attached to the ring on the butt. The woman had _let go_ of the wire, throwing it harder then she had when she had failed to dodge it. Hinata remembered what Kurenai had said. About it seeming like Anko trying to kill her.

"Ano… sensei…I missed… how-erm… you… you could have-… you know" _killed me!_ She wanted to scream, but she was far too polite and unsure of herself to do anything like that.

"Nonsense Hina-chan. I knew you would be able to dodge it, no sweat. I had faith in you, see? If I didn't I wouldn't risk spending some time talking to the ANBU over a training accident. I'd never be able to live down killing my first student on the first day, thought it might make some interesting stories… hmm and I'd be able to get out of teaching for life most likely…" she said, while tapping the side of her head with her finger as if she was contemplating that such a thing had possibilities.

Hinata gulped and looked at her sensei with wide eyes. Would her sensei really… kill her so she wouldn't have to teach anyone ever again? The thought was madness, she would have dismissed it earlier in that day that no one would be so cruel as to do that… but Anko was a scary woman, and she found herself having a tiny bit of doubt in her conviction right now.

Still, another part of what she had said resonated in her head. _I knew you would be able to dodge it, no sweat. I had faith in you, see?_ How did this woman who hardly knew her have such faith in her… so much faith in her abilities that she would risk her (Hinata's) life on them? Especially after the dismal presentation just a few moments prior. _She_ didn't trust her own abilities to the point of putting her life in the hands her skills, why did her knew sensei who didn't even know her make her take that weight, that responsibility? A small part of her, however, ate up her words like would a starving man in prison. Though she knew the woman had nothing to base those sentiments on, a part of her inside felt warm and... _happy_ at just hearing those words. Even if it as small, it felt good.

And a scary thought came over Hinata. With real surprise at the suddenness of it, she realized she would gladly risk her life like this if it earned her the recognition of her teacher, her Jounin Sensei, Anko-san. It all at once saddened her and embarrassed her as well as made her nervous and just (if she was brave enough to allow herself to feel it) a little bit of hope. That she would suddenly be craving the recognition of this woman she had hardly met and didn't know made was what made her feel somewhat embarrassed and pathetic at being so needy for attention and praise.

But if someone were to recognize her, if she were to feel like she earned it… Hinata quickly cleared those thoughts away. Given how dismal she was, she doubted such a thing would come to pass.

Still, she would try, even if she knew she would likely fail. She would not know what to do with her life if she gave up… it was too dark an outcome to contemplate. So she would try, she would, she would do her best.

Hinata stood up, ignoring the dribbling of blood down her neck. She faced her Jounin Sensei head on, a look of determination on her face. "What now, sensei?"

The snake woman looked at the girl in front of her, and smiled, inwardly pleased._You'll do just fine. You can do much, much better than you realize… and you will, if I have anything to say about it. _

Anko reached into one of her pockets and produced a scroll. Hinata stared as in one smooth motion, her new sensei opened the scroll and laid it down in front of her, the small scroll unrolling to almost fifteen feet across.

The woman bent down and placed her hands on the scroll, letting her chakra flow into it. Within a few seconds the chakra spread, covering the whole scroll and making the whole thing glow. Then there were a series of pops and suddenly the whole area around the scroll was covered in white smoke.

A few seconds later the smoke cleared, and Hinata gasped. In front of Anko where the scroll was there were now dozens, no _hundreds_ of kunai, all of them looking very real and very sharp to her keen eye.

Anko picked up a handful in each hand and shoved them into her coat pockets. She then shoved more into pockets all inside her coat, and even more disappeared _somewhere_ inside her coat, Hinata could only guess she had a kunai pouch under her heavy coat or hidden pockets or something.

The woman grinned wickedly at the young Hyuuga as she picked up four more kunai and held them in her hands. The girl paled as she could clearly see where this was going.

"Now, for your training. For the next three hours I'm going to try to turn you into a kunai pin cushion. Your job is to not let that happen. Do whatever you think is necessary, but you are not to leave the training grounds," the woman gave the young Hyuuga an evil and spine shuddering smile, "I'm not going to kill you, but you had better give me all you've got. If I think you're slacking off or not trying your best I'm going to hurt you. I'm going to hurt you bad. And you're going to wish you had never even heard of crazy 'lil me," as she said this, she licked the blade of one of the kunai in her hand in a decidedly unfriendly way that sent more shivers down Hinata's back, "and I keep all my promises. Are we clear on that Hina-chan?"

Hinata just nodded, too stunned and scared to come up with an intelligent reply.

"Good!" said Anko merrily, like she hadn't just been threatening her student in a most graphic and intimidating way. She crossed her arms around her chest in preparation to throw her projectiles. "Shall we get started then?"

000

**A/N:** I hope you liked. I plan on making this story quite long, playing out (at least, there may be more) how Hinata matures. Suggestions welcome, constructive criticism a plus, flames hmmm not so much. Please review.

I hope to post within a week. My goal is once a week posting.

Thanks for reading.


	3. Bugs, Friends, Orders

It was 9am, and Kurenai stood leaning against a tree while Kiba was trying to get Shino into a conversation about something, the stoic boy only giving him one or two word answers. It was amusing since Kiba seemed to be able to carry on a conversation by himself, but Kurenai was only listening with half an ear. She was anxious to see how Hinata's first morning of training had gone. Kurenai trusted Anko to teach her well and to not kill her or anything like that… but knowing Anko, she was worried that her generally bloodthirsty style might be too much for the young Hyuuga to handle.

Ten minutes passed, and Kurenai sensed that Kiba and Shino were getting a little anxious about their other teammate's absence.

Kiba came up to her, and said, "Hey Kurenai-sensei, where do you think Hinata has gone off to? I can't ever remember her ever being late for anything back when we were in the academy. Do you think maybe we should go look for her?" by Kiba's suggestion and way of saying it that was obviously what he wanted to do. He seemed a little worried about her.

Kurenai mulled it over in her head, thinking if she should tell them about Hinata's additional training right now. Then she realized there was no way she was going to be able to keep it from them, given Anko's tendencies and the fact that the girl did not have time to go home before coming to meet them. So she decided to tell them carefully,

"Hinata can't train at home right now, so to help her along she is going to be getting help from someone. They are going to be training mostly before we meet in the morning, as opposed to you guys who do it in the evenings when you train with your families. This was their first day together… so it's understandable if she needs… a little time extra to get here. I'm sure she's fine Kiba."

Kiba looked at her with a puzzled look on his face, and even Shino had his eyebrows go up a little above his glasses. Pushing his glasses up his nose as seemed to be his habit, Shino said, "That is a bit unusual, isn't it". It was more of a statement than a question, and beckoned their sensei to elaborate further.

Kurenai sighed, "Yes, well, that's how it's going to be for the foreseeable future, unless Hinata decides she doesn't want to do this training anymore. If you want to know what is going on at her home, you're going to have to ask her. It's not my place to tell."

Around that time, Hinata stumbled in to the small clearing. She was dragging her feet and her head was hanging down, and it was clear that she was exhausted. When Kurenai took a look at her appearance, she was unhappy but (how did it ever get to this point?) very much not surprised.

Hinata's clothes, her dark blue shinobi pants and her hooded jacket, had cuts and gashed all over. The arms, the torso, the legs, all had cuts that clearly had been made by some sort of sharp weapon. To make things worse, there were small but clearly visible areas where the blood has seeped into her clothes around where the gashes had been made. There was one particular gash in her shoulder, where blood had been especially flowing and it left a stain of blood on her jacket that ran down most of her upper arm. Hinata looked tired and haggard and well, like she had been beaten up or made to stay up most of the night.

The reactions of the other two members of her team amused Kurenai though. There was very little that Kurenai could see of Shino's face because of the collar, but by the movement of his visible face muscles and collar she was sure that his jaw had dropped open. Kiba however was approaching her slowly, with a dumbfounded look on his face, the muscles of his face twitching as he walked awkwardly over to her.

As he got in front of her, Hinata just stood there looking down at the ground, obviously from exhaustion. Kiba sniffed her, and at the same time Hinata started to raise her head. She raised it just in time to get a loud outburst from Kiba right in her face, "YOU SMELL LIKE BLOOD!" then Kiba grabbed her by the shoulders and started shaking her, "WHAT HAPPENED? WHO ATTACKED YOU? WE'LL GET THAT ASSHOLE YOU HEAR ME HINATA! HE'S NOT GOING TO GET AWAY WITH THIS!"

Kiba whipped around in a frenzy to Kurenai, "Kurenai-sensei! We should get her to the hospital! We gotta find out who attacked her, we gotta…"

"RELAX Kiba," said Kurenai, "It's ok, calm down there is a perfectly good explanation for this. And no, Hinata does not need to go to the hospital. Her wounds have already been healed, if you would pay a little attention. No one atta.. well, there is an explanation for this."

Kiba looked skeptical, and Shino went back to being his stoic self. Looking back and forth from Hinata, who was holding her hand to her ear because her ears hurt from Kiba's shouting, and Kurani who was standing leaning against the tree not entirely happy but not concerned either, Kiba had to ask the obvious question.

"So what happened to Hinata?" he asked quizzically.

Kurenai sighed. "Hinata, why don't you tell them what happened to you."

Hinata's ears finally felt more or less back to normal, not so much pain and it was fast fading, so she looked up at her teammates and said, "Hai..,"

"Ermm… well…"Hinata began, "I had a new sensei… I met today earlier for training…"

"So was there an attack that he fended off but you got injured in the fighting?" asked an excited but worried Kiba.

"aa… ummm… not really no…" Hinata cleared her throat in the delicate way well bred young ladies were taught to do such things. "Well, you see…m-my sensei did this to me… bu-but only as part of the training!" she said that last part in a rush. She saw the incredulous look on Kiba's face, and the now again (doesn't happen this many times very often) raised eyebrows of Shino, and she turned away to the side, index fingers pushing against each other in her now familiar gesture of nervousness.

"Ano… I'm so…errr! I mean… ummm… a…. I mean… I don't want you guys worrying about me, it's, it's fine." She said the last still looking away from her teammates, not daring to look at them and seeing what their reactions might be.

Kiba looked her up and down, seeing the dried blood and the gashes all over her clothing, the worn down and haggard look on her, her obvious exhaustion, and said: "Hinata… I don't know who you are training with, but they are really kind of fucking nuts. Are you sure you wanna train with this guy?"

"Ano… she…Anko-sensei is very good, so… yea, I do." Hinata said shyly, but she did sound like she was sure of what she was saying. Kurenai smiled. The girl had guts, even if she didn't even realize it and it didn't see the light of day most of the time. She doubted most of the girls in her class would be considering going back for more after just one day with Anko.

Kiba however gaped at her, and said, "Hinata! She turned you into a pin cushion! Look at you! Why would you want to go back?!"

Shino spoke up from behind, to everyone's surprise, "I'm inclined to agree with Kiba on this. These training methods do seem a bit… extreme, and unnecessary for developing proper skill. You also need to be in good condition to train and perform missions with your team. It is your choice Hinata, but I would ask that you please take these things into consideration, and think about the wellbeing of your team if you were to arrive here in this condition every day."

Kurenai decided it was time to intervene. Though she wasn't crazy about Anko's training methods, the woman would, could, do wonders for Hinata. She didn't want to risk her teammate's concern, however commendable their concerns for her wellbeing may be, to dissuade Hinata from continuing her training when that was obviously what she had intended to do.

The Jounin spoke up, "Hinata, did you go to the hospital?" she asked, already knowing the answer to that question.

Hinata looked at her, and shook her head. "No Kurenai-sensei. Anko-sensei h-healed my wounds after we were done. And…and then she made me t-take a blood replacement pill, and then made me eat breakfast before I came…here."

Kurenai nodded. "I see. So the wounds you received were taken care of, and steps were taken to help with any possible problems caused by loss of blood."

Hinata nodded. "H-hai sensei."

Kurenai moved around the tree to get into a position where she could look straight at Hinata, then continued, "Shino has a point Hinata, in that you need to be fit enough to handle the responsibilities you have to your team. Did you and Anko-san consider that?"

Hinata nodded. "H-hai Kurenai-sensei. She said… well basically… ummm… she s-said, we would w-work as hard as possible, but if you informed her…t-that I was not performing up to expectations… then… ermm we would cut b-back the w-w-w-work l-l-load acc-…ccordingly." Hinata got a scared look on her face as she stuttered badly through the last part.

Kurenai had to school her face not to laugh. Anko would never say something that politely (unless it was a threat of some kind). What she had most likely told the girl was that if 'Kurenai came bitching' about her being too tired she would be forced to cut back on training and that she would take it out of her hide.

She felt sorry for the girl, as she did with anyone who had to train with Anko, but she was confident this would be good for Hinata.

Then Kurenai's voice took a commanding air to it, becoming a bit stern as well. This was the last part she was going to address for the sake of the two boys. "Hinata, you were late for our meeting today by more than ten minutes. This isn't going to become a common occurrence it is?"

The girl looked like a deer caught in a headlights, not expecting the stern tone. Then she bowed low to her sensei, "Ano, I'm sorr-…err.. ahhh… I didn't… umm… it's…aaaa…," all three looked at her curiously, this particular struggle was painful even by Hinata standards, "what I mean to say.. is.. emmm… I-I underestimated the time… it would take me to get here… and I got a bit lost…it won't happen again, I swear!"

Kurenai noticed clearly that the girl had stopped herself from apologizing, twice now in the span of a few minutes. It was nothing like the girl. The Jounin supposed Anko would have something to do with that. She would have to be sure to bring it up to the Special Jounin when they met up that evening to have a little talk about the girl and (if it all worked out today) to make things a little more formal.

"That's fine Hinata. I'm sure you'll be here on time from now on." She said. Hinata just nodded.

Kurenai clapped her hands once, then said "All right then, if there is nothing else," and she made it known by her tone that there had better not be anything else, as much as Kiba and Shino might have wanted to press the matter about her teammate's condition, "we'll head out to the Hokage tower and receive our first assigned mission. I'm sure we will get it done before lunch, if all goes well. Let's move out."

Kiba and Shino dropped the subject of Hinata and her training, for now, and proceeded to walk back towards the village. Hinata for her part was clever enough to realize that her sensei had just helped her out, and she had in fact boosted Hinata's confidence in that she had done/chosen the right thing, even if her teammates didn't understand right now. She caught her sensei's eye and gave her a quick nod of thanks respectfully. Kurenai just smiled at her, and started walking behind the boys.

000

"I can't believe this garbage! Cleaning stables? Cleaning stables!? What does shoveling around horse shit have to do with ANYTHING! This isn't a job worthy of a ninja! Who decided to take this as a _mission_anyway!"

Kurenai was rubbing her fingers together between her eyes already starting to get a headache. "Kiba, shut up."

They had just left the Hokage tower after being assigned their first D-Ranked mission. Nothing too eventful had happened there. First the Third had taken a look at Hinata, and immediately asked playfully if it had been Ibiki or Anko who had been training her. Hinta answered shyly that it had been Anko-san, and Kiba seemed about to explode in a rage at Hinata's "condition" being treated so lightly by the Hokage. Shino just stood by without showing any reaction of any sort.

Then they had been given their mission. When the Hokage had told them what it was, Kiba started shouting, and Kurenai had to smack him on the back of the head, hard, so his face hit the ground, to keep him from saying anything more insulting to the Hokage. Hinata blushed and looked embarrassed, and Shino gave Kiba a short lecture about new genin having to complete 50 D-Ranked missions before they could be given anything higher. This made Kiba even more upset, and Kurenai had to be silence him with a minor genjutsu projecting a large dose of her killer intent on him. Kiba turned white and got the hint to keep his mouth shut after that. The Hokage looked amused by the whole proceeding.

Kurenai asked for a private word, and her students waited outside while she talked to the Sandaime. She just mentioned Hinata's situation, leaving nothing out, and asked him not to mention to Hiashi or any of the Hyuuga that Hinata was being trained by Anko. She had to be careful not to let any of her growing resentment for the Hyuuga clan or Hiashi himself leak out, as it would be a break in decorum. The Hokage said he was very saddened by the situation, and indeed the Jounin thought he did seem genuinely concerned, and agreed not to mention it to the Hyuuga.

Though he did say that if he was asked directly he would have no choice but to reply truthfully. To make up for it, he said he would work the roster and make it so Anko did not have any out of town missions for about a month, in hopes that meeting everyday in the beginning would foster a strong relationship between teacher and student. That was very unexpected and Kurenai was touched by the consideration of the Hokage. She thanked the Hokage, and after a bow (maybe a little deeper than was required, but she felt he had earned it) she left.

So now they were outside the tower, and Kiba now had free reign to explode about their first mission as shinobi. Granted it was bad, even rescuing Tora the cat would have been better than this. But still, she was starting to get one of those headaches, and she wasn't about to let Kiba's screaming make it worse.

"But sensei, they should hire stablehands not ninja! And why does the old man take these crap missions anyway?"

Kurenai sighed. "Listen Kiba, it may not be glamorous, but these are missions non the less. They exist mainly to foster teamwork, they make the village richer simply by the sheer number of them, and they help put a bit of money in a genin's pocket while their Jonin, _me, _gets them up to snuff for a more risky mission, like protecting a caravan from thieves or cleaning out bandits or something like that."

Kiba snorted at this, "Pfft, we are ready for those missions now."

"No," said Kureani, "you're not. And if you complain again I'll have you thinking you've turned into a girl for the rest of the day." she said casually.

Kiba shut up and eyed her out of the corner of his eye. "You can do that?"

Kurenai gave him a tight smile and looked at him out of the corner of her eye. "I'm a genjustsu specialist. Try me."

Kiba gave a small shudder and decided to keep his mouth shut after that.

000

They had arrived at the address just a few miles outside the walls of Konoha, to a large farm that raised horses. Though cattle and livestock for food was common, throughout most of the elemental countries horses were a relatively rare commodity.

This old man who had hired them was called Inuki Janos and ran a small business where he sold and bred horses. His mares only gave birth to two or three horses a year, so he only sold about that many a year.

The man had practically yelled at them "My horses are the only ones that are fast enough to outrun shinobi!" all of the four ninja of team eight were very skeptical at that, "The Fire Lord and high nobles are the only ones that buy from me. Best of the best horses, I tell ya!" he boasts loudly.

Janos was a short man in his sixties with a bad back that had to walk with a cane. So he often had to hire ninja to come and clean out the stables… he insisted it was about as expensive as stable help and ninja did a better job. It was a ridiculous claim, there was no way that was true about the prices. But who were they to complain? No need to really argue with the man. So they got to working.

Janos led all the horses out to a very large, green fenced pasture behind the barn. There were about a dozen stables to clean and replace with new hay and feed. The youngsters divided up the work: Kiba (by luck of the draw) had to use a shovel and pitchfork combination to put all the old dirty hay and horse manure onto a wheelbarrow. Shino ran back and forth with the wheel barrow and put it in a giant fertilizer/compost pile that the Janos had around the back.

Hinata meanwhile cleaned out the horse's food racks, their water buckets, hosed the floors once they were free of hay, and cleaned whatever else needed to be cleaned. Hinata found herself enjoying the work quite a bit. She didn't get to use her hands and lug around big bags of feed, or do anything like manual labor, back in the confines of the Hyuuga compound or in the urban Konoha. She found it was somewhat to her liking.

Kiba on the other hand was grumbling the whole time under his breath about shoveling manure and smelly hay. Shino for his part did not seem to mind, and somehow was the only one to keep his clothes meticulously clean, even though he was carting around manure so often. Hinata wasn't sure but she thought the stoic boy might be having an ok time of it, too.

It took them about two hours to finish all twelve stalls, when Kurenai called them together. "All right, good work team. We'll talk about the mission on the way back. Get cleaned up a little, drink some water from the hose and we'll leave in a few minutes." With that she walked off and disappeared… wherever she had gone the whole time they had been working. All three genin were pretty sure that their sensei was not the type of girl who would willingly hang out amongst piles of horse manure, hardened shinobi or not.

Shino turned away from his team. "I'll be back in a few minutes" he said, and walked off not telling them where he was headed. Hinata and Kiba shrugged to each other, and went to get cleaned up as best they could.

Shino, in the meantime, went over the large and smelly manure and compost pile. He had seen something before that had caught his eye, but he had not had time to investigate since the wheelbarrow was needed to keep up with Kiba's shoveling. Now he knelt down next to the large pile, ignoring, or in fact in a way relaxing around, all the insects that were flying around in all directions.

He looked at the pile for a few minutes until he noticed it… a small beetle. It was black, kind of generic looking to the untrained eye. But Shino was an expert in like most of his family, and he could clearly tell, this was a species of beetle he had never seen before. The proportions were slightly off to be one of the more common strands, and it was also slightly smaller as well, though by the shell this one was clearly and adult. He considered collecting it, but that would be pointless in really understanding this creature.

It looked to him…yes, there he spotted others. By the way they were travelling his eyes went wide. They seemed to be following each other. Could this be… they had never found a species before, but it looked like these beetles might be working cooperatively… maybe even part of a hive or community of some sort… interesting. And it was amazing they had not been found even though they lived just a few miles outside of Konoha. This would need to be investigated.

"Oh, hey, I see you looking at the bugs. You wouldn't happen to be one of them bug shinobi, what do they call them… ermmm let's see… oh, an Aburame would ya?" came a voice from behind him.

Shino stood up and turned around to find the old man Janos looking at him. He had been so distracted he had not heard him behind him. A serious lapse for a shinobi, but he shrugged it off.

"Janos-san, I seem to have found what might be a previously unknown species of insect on your property. I would like to make arrangements so that myself and my clan could study them… it is remarkable for my clan to find a new species living so close to the walls of Konoha. And they seem to have interesting properties."

Janos stroked his chin, looking at the boy quizzically, "Well, I guess you are an Aburame then. Hmmm but I don't want people just coming and going, it would be disturbing for my little babies and I just can't have that hmm…"

Shino just stared at him without showing any emotion. The man noticed, and then smiled.

"Very well, but I can't have just anybody coming around making a mess off my grass and scaring my horses. I'll allow YOU to come and study the bugs if you want. BUT there is a price…you have to help me doing some of the stable work around here when you come to study the little buggers… AND you have to bring some good food, to share with me after you are all finished. That is my price. Is that acceptable to you Aburame-san?"

Shino thought about it for a moment. He didn't particularly like stable work, but it wasn't that bad either. The food would not be a problem. However, he could not be sure what was behind the man's motivations, some part of him told him that there was something else going on here, there was something else that the man wanted. He didn't feel it was something malevolent, but there was definitely something else going on. Not that it mattered anyway. He would have to report this to his father and his clan, and there was no way they would allow this opportunity to study a new communal species to be passed up, if the price for doing it was so low.

"Hai. That is acceptable Janos-san. Now if you'll excuse me, I need to get back to my team."

As Shino walked off, Janos looked after him. He stroke his chin in a contemplative gesture again, and smiled. "You might do Aburame," he said to himself under his breath, "you might do."

000

They returned to town and it was almost one in the afternoon. Though still tired Hinata felt revived after all that walking and manual labor, even if she was a little smelly and dirty. They were all hungry as well, and Kiba suggested they go to Ichiraku's. Kurenai would have liked to go someplace nicer, and Hinata had packed a lunch (the other two had not thought of that on their first day, oh well), but the fact was they were all smelly and hungry and Ichiraku's was likely the only place that would serve them in their current condition. So Ichiraku's it was.

To Hinata's surprise there was another genin team from their graduating class there.

"Great," muttered Kiba, "Choji is cool, I guess the genius is ok, but why did his crazy fangirl have to be here as well?"

Team 10 under Asuma, Hinata thought looking at them, was probably the strongest team out of their rookie class. Not because of Choji and Ino, they were pretty good (better than her at any rate), but because of the genius shinbi who was the third member of their team.

Namikaze Sarutobi was the elite of all elites in Konoha genin, and in Konoha, period. The son of the Fourth, he insisted his friends call him "Naruto" as that was the name his father would have preferred him to have he claimed, was adopted and raised as the grandson of the Sandaime. For some reason the Third had given Namikaze Sarutobi his family name as the blonde's first name… it was really odd, but it did give his name such a kind of weight and importance and aristocracy that it was hard to say the boy's name without a bit of a revering tone in your voice.

She had heard the boy had been raised and trained by private tutors in the Sarutobi compound his whole life, she contemplated as they moved closer to the group. He had played with kids from other clans when young, she knew Kiba and Shino had been among them, but her father had never allowed her to play with the boy… so he was a stranger to her. Her father got a twisted and scary look on his face whenever the blonde was brought up. Maybe the boy's father had done something to anger father? Or something to their clan? She didn't know, and seeing how her father got whenever Namikaze Sarutobi was brought up, she thought it better not to ask.

It was only in their very last year in the academy that the blonde with odd scars on his face joined them. He quickly displaced the Uchiha as the best in the class, and was giving him a run for his money in the number of fangirls. Ino quickly became the ringleader for the Namikaze fangirls, and the pink headed Haruno girl had been so for the Uchiha. Hinata always thought the whole thing was rather odd.

The boy mostly stuck with his friends from childhood, Choji, Shikamaru, Kiba, Shino, and Sasuke when he came to school. From what she could tell Naruto had been closest to the Uchiha boy, in the academy and growing up. Even though the dark haired boy was pissed at being knocked down to number two, the two had a friendly rivalry and could sympathize with each other in trying to escape their fan girls. Hinata never did get close to the Namikaze boy. His and his best friend's Sasuke's fangirls would never have let her within a mile of either one anyway if she had tried. Now that she thought about it, she really hadn't made close friends with anyone.

There were even rumors that the twelve year old Namikaze had already been selected and was being groomed by the Third to become the next Hokage. By his pedigree, and his reputed skills, Hinata could not say she was surprised. The boy really was quite amazing.

As they sat down to eat, "Naruto" greeted his friends loudly, and even greeted her, surprising her by remembering her name. They spared a look at her appearance, and when Naruto asked her what happened, she blushed lightly and said, "training, mission". He seemed to accept that while Ino looked at her open mouthed, but the blonde said nothing.

Hinata said hi to everyone politely, and sat down on the end. Shino and Kiba had known the other two boys for years, and Ino did not want to be left out (even though Kiba insulted her for being a fangirl which then got him attacked by said crazed girl as a result) so they all mingled while Hinata sat at the end booth. She was mostly ignored, but that was ok, it wasn't like she was close to any of them… except maybe now Kiba and Shino, she thought with a blush. But these were old friends, and it was best if she just stood aside.

To her surprise, she caught Kurenai-sensei laughing and giggling with Asuma. They seemed to be enjoying each other's company a great deal… she wondered how long they had known each other.

She ordered her miso ramen, and it was quickly delivered by a sympathetic looking Ayame. Hinata smiled shyly back at the friendly girl that was always at Ichiraku's, not sure what the sympathetic look was all about, and began to eat her miso.

000

Afterwards, the team went back to their favored training ground, training ground 11. They spent the next few hours working with Kurenai on recognizing when they had been caught in a genjustus. The tell tale signs, the particular feelings it might invoke, and a bit today on how to break one. Though some of the people she had taught, like Kiba, really didn't have a talent for genjutsu, Kurenai was determined to get them all to at least recognize one, break one, and at the very least be able to cast some of the most simple and basic genjutsu. Though simple and basic, that did not mean they were not useful.

Besides, she was a genjutsu specialist. Though she was aware she needed to make her students as well rounded as possible, she did have some inherent bias towards genjutsu.

It turned out Hinata seemed to have at least some fair amount of proficiency at genjutsu. The fact was however that it was her surprisingly good chakra control that just made it _seem_ like she had a natural talent for genjutsu, Kurenai realized a bit later. She was in reality more or less neutral to it.

Genjutsu was at least in some respects like elemental affinity. Some people were naturally proficient at it, some were about neutral to it, and some naturally were just much weaker at it.

To her surprise, while Kiba was weak at it and Hinata was more or less neutral, Shino was actually naturally strong in genjutsu. With his natural talent and Hinata's great chakra control, she would have to see about teaching them some genjutsus that would be useful in combat and in the field. They would probably have the skill to handle some of the more basic combat and cloaking genjustus before long.

At the end of it as expected, Hinata could mostly recognize some genjustu cast on her, Shino was very adept at spotting them, and Kiba did could not realize it for the most part unless it was painfully obvious he was in a genjutsu (like in going blind, or having the terrain look or feel unnatural in some way).

She had yet to see how Kiba's nose, Shino's bugs and Hinata's Byakugan could be used to help detect or circumvent some genjutsus. She couldn't be positive, but she had a strong suspicion they could be used to some strong effect. If nothing else, Akamaru could bite Kiba to snap him out of some genjutsus.

After a few hours, she thought they had had enough for their first day. She dismissed them, told them that she had something to do and told them to meet back in the training field the next day at the same time. Before anyone could think to ask her anything, she made the signs for Shunshin no Jutsu and disappeared from view.

Hinata walked back to town with her teammates, and then it struck her that Kurenai had said the day before that Anko would want to meet with her after her training was done. She didn't think to ask Kurenai where she could find Anko. Hinata started to get a little worried and fidgeting… if she was supposed to meet with Anko and she didn't show up… Hinata had to keep herself calm and not think about the possible consequences. It wouldn't do to start panicking in front of her team.

As they were getting back into town, Kiba asked the question that had been bugging him most of the day. "So, Hinata… sensei mentioned that you started training with that new psycho teacher because you couldn't train at home. Did something happen?" he asked. Shino was also in rapt attention, this had been bothering him all day as well.

Hinata just looked down, and played with the hem of her jacket. "Amm… um…"Hinata was thinking fast. She didn't really want to tell her team, tell them about all the things that had been going on between her, the clan, and her… father. She was ashamed, especially because it had all been a result of her failure.

At the same time, she didn't want to leave them in the dark and just brush them off. She didn't want them to think she didn't trust them or anything.

"Umm… well… my father… is not too happy with me right now. S-so,… umm he's not training me … right now…" she said. It was truthful, but didn't really lead them to think it was because of her being terrible at everything she did… she felt a little bad at the deception, but she really couldn't bear it if her new teammates started to see her…as the failure her father saw.

So, they asked the next logical question. "Why isn't your father happy with you?"

Hinata looked down, and even the normally unobservant Kiba could tell that all of a sudden she was feeling depressed. "I.. I don't w-want to t-talk about it… I'm sor… ummm… so yea. I'm sorr.. ack! I mean.. so.. please understand."

Shino and Kiba were puzzled by this, but knew enough not to continue pressing the issue. Still, both of them looked at each other, and they were in agreement. They didn't know what Hinata had done, but for her to be acting like this and forced to go somewhere else for training, whatever was going on, it had to her father and her family who were in the wrong. It wasn't right to leave such a sweet girl feeling like this.

They walked for another couple of minutes in silence. Hinata had begun to wonder if she would go all the way to her home, and then have to go out looking for her sensei. She knew she had to meet up with her somehow tonight (the sun was already starting to set), or Anko-sensei would most likely end up making her regret it in uncomfortable and painful ways.

Luckily for her, she did not have to go looking for her sensei. Suddenly in the middle of the street leaves started to swirl around her for a second before she felt someone appear behind her. Hinata felt a pair of arms wrap around her head. She got a little panicked as she felt the arms pull her head right into a pair of big…_voluptuous…_breasts. Anko had appeared behind her and was holding her to her chest when she said,

"Ah, Hina-chan I see you are done! Now it's time for me to take over sweetie cakes. Can't have you slacking off if I'm going to turn you into a bad-ass kunoichi now can I?" the Special Jounin giggled, then started laughing, and then started laughing maniacaly much to the confusion and surprise of the two boys at the sudden new arrival. Hinata for her part was deftly frightened. She had only met the woman in the morning, but she had already got the idea that this couldn't be good.

Anko looked at the two younger boys. She waved at them and smiled playfully while still holding Hinata close to her and hanging over her shoulder. "See ya," the Special Jounin said, and then she and Hinata disappeared in a swirl of leaves.

After they left, Kiba stared at the spot where they had just been for a few minutes before speaking. "Man, that chick was hot. I wish she was hanging all over me like the way she was doing to Hinata." Kiba turned to his friend, "who do you think she was, Shino?"

Shino, perhaps a tad frustrated at his teammate's denseness, pushed his glasses up his nose, and said, "By what she said, she was clearly the new instructor that Hinata began training under today."

"WHAT? That hot chick is the crazy bitch that turned Hinata into a pin cushion?" he said in shock. Then tears started running down his eyes, "no way, why do all the hot girls have to be either fangirls or flat crazy."

"That is illogical," said Shino as he turned to walk away, "by standards of beauty there are two attractive women in our team. Kurenai-sensei is in high demand amongst men, and gathers considerable male attention wherever she goes. Hinata is a cute girl, but her shy personality keeps most from noticing this. Neither one of which in my judgment falls into the category of 'crazy' or 'fangirl'."

"Yea, I guess you're right… Kurenai-sensei is really, really hot, just not a good idea to start thinking about your sensei that way…" then he stopped, and pointed at Shino accusingly, "Hey! You don't have a crush on Hinata or Kurenai-sensei do you?"

"Don't be stupid Kiba. I was merely pointing out facts."

"Um. Yea. Ok." And Kiba ran up to keep catch up with his friend who had started walking away from him.

"So, Shino, do you know anything about Hinata's new sensei?" Kiba asked.

Shino thought for a moment. Then answered, "No, but I can tell you she is very, very good."

Kiba looked at him puzzled. "How could you tell that? All we saw her use was Shunshin no Jutsu… we can't do it, but still, it's a fairly common skill."

Shino looked at his friend questioningly. The Inuzuka boy really could benefit from a little more academic work. "I say she is very good because she did a number of difficult things."

"Yea, like what?" asked Kiba.

Shino looked up as he thought how to phrase it. "First, when she took Hinata away, she took away the two of them, which makes the skill much more difficult to Shunshin with another person."

"Ok."

"Secondly, she Shunshined a considerable distance. They were clearly out of sight and we did not sense them reappear, so she must have gone some distance away."

"Ok. That sounds impressive, but I still don't know why you give her such praise."

"Third and last, she didn't use hand seals."

Kiba thought about it, and realized Shino was right. _Damn, why didn't I notice that?_

"So, what does that say about her level of skill?"

"Kiba… can you do any of the academy Jutsu without handsigns?"

"No…"

"There you go."

Kiba put his hands behind his head and looked up at the sky. It wasn't that big a deal right, the girl couldn't be that good. "Pfft, whatever" he said.

As the two boys walked home Hinata's training began anew.

000

_**Years before…the Uchiha compound… the night of the Massacre…**_

_Itachi stood atop a rooftop across from the Uchiha compound. He was dressed in full ANBU gear, sword ready. His Sharingan came to life. _

_On orders he would do this… orders that had secretly been changed, by the Hokage, at the last minute… Itachi knew the man did not have the authority to do that, but orders were orders, and he only took them from one man. Frankly, he was very glad for them. _

_He jumped and ran, and began… _

_His first target was the strongest… his own father… who was a competent Shinobi, a smart leader and a respected Jounin…_

_He was no match for him…_

_Itachi split his father's heart in two while he slept… _

_His mother had been a Jounin years before. He saw her eyes widen in shock before his blade sliced her throat. Willing himself to feel nothing, he left, knowing she was no danger now and death would soon follow… it took at most forty seconds for someone to die from having the arteries in the neck cut… _

_Sentries stationed in strategic places around the compound were next. But he knew where they were, the weaknesses of the positions, and that of each individual member… he had lived with them all his life, after all… _

_He had to remind himself, will himself to feel nothing. This was orders… it had to be done. _

_With a stealth envied and almost supernatural even by shinobi standards, Itachi then began to slip into home after home of shinobi… keeping whole households asleep with genjutsu… and claiming the lives of every shinobi in the compound. _

_Even the older youths, not yet shinobi, he killed. Their mind would be filled with the poison of pride that engulfed the Uchiha… part of the reason that this night was necessary. _

_He did not kill everyone, however… no, his orders were different now…_

_The children, younger than ten years, they were allowed to live… Itachi had been deeply relieved, as this saved the one her cared for most… but he had never allowed that to show when he received his orders. _

_Next, the women who had never been shinobi. The ones he was sure were not party to the conspiracy, and who would be good and kind… who would not perpetuate the mentality that had led to this tipping point… but in case he was wrong, they would be watched and disposed of if need be in the future. _

_Sadly, only a handful met the criteria. Perhaps a fifth of those women he allowed to live. _

_Every grown man in Uchiha… shinobi or tradesman… they all died. After the shinobi were disposed of, a simple genjutsu made sure everyone remained asleep in the whole compound. If he had cast it sooner, there was a danger the shinobi would have detected it. _

_When he was done, there was one last thing to take care of… documents in his father's study, the council and the Hokage wanted… _

_He went and retrieved them. It took much longer than expected, to find the hidden compartments, and to undo the seals. But in minutes he was done, and went to walk out the front door. _

_To his surprise, Sasuke was there… standing in his way. Looking in the door at where his parents lay. His brother looked up at him, panic and tears in his eyes…_

"_Brother! Mom and dad… they are dead! W-Who did this?! What happened?!" the little boy said in a crazed voice. The boy must have been awake when he cast the genjutsu to make sure they all stayed asleep. _

_Itachi looked at his brother, his beloved younger brother, and a tiny bit of emotion welled up. At first he had planned to make his brother hate him… it would have been best in the end. But with the plan changed, the Hokage not wiping out Uchiha, but gutting it, killing all the possible conspirators and leaving it weak… that would not be necessary anymore. _

_He wanted his brother to be happy. He did the only thing he could think of at the time. _

_He used his Mangekyo Sharingan, and along with a high power genjutsu did something only the Yamanaka's were thought to be able to do… he erased his brother's memories… of everything that had happened this night. _

_The young boy fell unconscious, and Itachi caught him. A tear fell down his eye as he picked up his younger brother and carried him away. _

_He left him in a field after delivering the documents at the assigned drop point. The field was miles from Konoha. He cast a genjutsu that would keep anyone from noticing Sasuke until the boy moved, and another one to keep the boy asleep for at least a day. _

_When the boy woke up he would have no trouble finding his way back to Konoha. _

_By the time he arrived at Uchiha, there will be nothing left. All the bodies gone, all the blood cleaned up, ANBU will have made sure there was nothing there for the boy to see. _

_It was like the boy would go to sleep, and when he woke up, he would find his whole family disappeared. It would be hard, but not like the memories he would have otherwise had. _

_The boy, he knew, would be broken when he found his family dead, and that his beloved older brother had been responsible. _

_But he would have other Uchiha. That would have to be enough. _

000

**A/N: **Hope you all like that chapter. O) Sorry if it wasn't eventful enough… I originally planned to put other things in this chapter. But it started getting too long, if I had added the other stuff here I would have had ended up with a chapter that was way too long. I'm shooting for 7-8k words a chapter. Next will chappy will be jucier, guaranteed.

Now explanations for a few things now:

As to Madara helping Itachi in the massacre… I guess I am deviating from canon. But, maybe not.

Did Madara _really_help Itachi wipe out the Uchiha clan? I mean, if that is true, then Madara also knew that Itachi was working under orders from Konoha…which meant that he must have known Itachi was a Konoha agent while inside Akatsuki.

Would Madara really have let Itachi know so many Akatsuki secrets (members, goals, secret bases, etc) if he knew all along he was a Konoha spy? Wouldn't this have seriously threatened his plans?

This could be due to the fact that Kishimoto just makes up the story as he goes along, so there are some inconsistencies. That is my guess anyway. But assuming it was all intentional, then the idea Madara helped Itachi has to be bogus. Itachi could have said it to poison Sasuke against Madara.

As to Naruto. He will play a fairly important part in the story, but again this is Hina-centric, so that is kind of how it goes.

Read, review, critique, tell me what you like and don't like, all that welcome. Flames, not as much.

Hope to update within a week. Take care all.


	4. Officially screwed

**A/N:** I want to say, thank you to all of you who have reviewed. Reviews are very nice, I like to hear what people like and don't like, and that they enjoy (or don't enjoy) the story. It makes it all the more rewarding as an author.

I also want to say thank you to everyone who is reading my story. I guess if you're reading this chapter, chapter 4, you probably think this story is good enough to keep reading. That is a huge compliment and I only hope I can continue to make the story meaningful and entertaining to you all.

Here is the latest chapter. Enjoy.

000

"Listen up brat; one of the most useful skills you can learn is basic Fuinjutsu. I promise you you'll be using it for the rest of your life. For example, how the hell else could I carry hundreds of kunai with me?" Anko said with a grin. "Now, my student, I'm going to show you how to seal crap, as I don't intend to spend time finding and sealing all those kunai after I've spent a few hours throwing them at you."

Hinata looked a bit nervously (how could you not be around this woman?) as Anko produced a scroll and proceeded to open it and place it on the ground. It was small, maybe two feet by two feet. It was also completely blank.

Anko reached into her coat smiling and produced a pair of kunai, a small ink bottle and a brush. She placed them down and opened the small ink bottle, and dipped the brush in the ink and cleaned off the excess ink on the rim.

"Now watch carefully Hina-chan," she said. Anko deftly drew a near perfect circle in the middle of the square scroll. Hinata watched on as Anko started drawing symbols and kanji on either side of the circle, the young Hyuuga trying to memorize them all as best she could. She was happy to note it was a rather simple design, just a circle in the middle and four different symbols (that looked like kanji, but either she didn't know them or they were really really old) on either side.

Then Anko grabbed one of the kunai she had put aside, and put it in the middle of the circle. She placed both hands over it, and told Hinata "To seal you need to spread your chakra evenly over the whole paper. Then use your will to get the kunai to become one with the symbols. After that, it should be automatic, and the kunai sealing into the paper." After she finished talking the paper began to glow, all the symbols lighting up brighter than the rest of the paper. Then the kunai sank into the paper, leaving in its place the familiar kanji for "kunai" inside the circle.

Hinata stared at it wide eyed and amazed. It seemed like magic… well, to lay people so did ninjutsu or genjutsu, but this was different. She had never seen something solid like a kunai turn into a bunch of ink on paper. It was, in a way… really neat.

"C-can I try sensei?" asked Hinata shyly.

"That's the point of all this Hina-chan." She said in a sing song voice. She motioned for the Hyuuga heiress to kneel across from her in front of the scroll.

"Now," the snake woman began, "in a circle this size, and with the way I have drawn the seal, you'd probably only be able to store five kunai in the circle. This is about as simple as they get." She threw the other kunai she had out on Hinata's lap. "Now you try the sealing."

Hinata grabbed the kunai, and nervously placed it on the circle, putting her hands over it as she had seen Anko do. She took a deep breath, trying not to think about the "what if's " of her getting wrong. Hinata spread he chakra over the kunai, and through the kunai into the paper. She did her best to place a small amount of chakra into the whole thing. When it didn't glow like it had with Anko, she started to get nervous, but realized she was probably using too little chakra and started pumping more into the kunai and paper, while making sure to keep it very even the entire time.

Her heart skip a beat when she saw the paper start to glow, and then the symbols start to glow like they had with sensei. Then slowly the kunai started to glow and sink into the paper, and she did her best to keep her chakra output steady so there wouldn't be any problems. The kunai disappeared altogether from under her hand, and then the glow faded. She took her hand away and looked at the result. There was another kanji for kunai in the circle, the two different kanji for kunai having rearranged each other so they were as far away as possible from each other and from the edges of the circle.

Hinata looked up at her teacher, hoping she wasn't showing as much eagerness as she felt on her face. She had really done it, she had really been able to do it. Yes! She couldn't remember ever getting a skill down right on the first try. Anko though was not looking at her, she was examining the paper. Then she sat back on her heels, crossed her arms and smiled at her, "I didn't think you'd get it on the first try brat. Your chakra control is freaky good, for a genin."

For some reason, the compliment made Hinata feel really embarrassed, but she had to bite her lip for her face not to break into a stupid grin. Her heart and her guts twisted, but in a good way. She was also nervous and afraid at the same time, but at the same time… it also felt good. It did feel _good_. Her new sensei wasn't a woman she knew very well, but was almost positive by her… forward way of speaking she didn't say anything unless it really was what she was thinking.

But what she said next made her heart and guts twist, but _not _in a good way.

"Your chakra reserves suck though. I mean they are really, really, and I mean_really_ bad. Compared to a kunoichi genin, they are maybe marginally above average. There isn't a girl's only shinobi world though, so we gotta compare you the boys too. And you don't measure up." she stood up.

Hinata stayed kneeling, looking down at the floor. She was crushed… she wasn't as… _stern_ (read: really nasty) as her father was about it, but she had just said it. Her chakra reserves sucked. She was average for a kunoichi, who despite all political correctness really _were_weaker than males on average. Boys were born stronger and with bigger chakra reserves. _And you don't measure up_, her words ringing in her ear. If someone as good and as forward as Anko-san _agreed_with her father, then it just proved to her that she was useless. She was inherently weak. Deficient. She was…

"So, if I'm gonna turn you into the best kunoichi, no fuck that, the best shinobi this town has ever seen, we're going to have to work on that a_lot_." She said, hands at her hips and staring dramatically off in the distance.

Hinata just stared at her wide eyed and disbelieving.

Anko then chuckled and scratched the back of her head, "Well, best shinobi ever is probably setting the bar too high right now. Old man Sarutobi and the Yondaime are a tough stick to measure against. Maybe we should go for feared and respected by everyone in the village, and then we go from there." She said to her kneeling student with a smile that was somehow playful, predatory, and completely serious all at the same time.

Hinata gaped at her. She had just finished deriding her about her chakra reserves, and now…

The young Hyuuga's mind cleared out of her funk a bit to see things more clearly. For the first time she realized that Anko had not actually said that _she_didn't measure, Anko didn't imply that _she _was deficient and below average and useless… she was just talking about her chakra reserves. In that way she was different from her father. Her father would have seen her low chakra reserves as a sign that she was useless. Anko saw it as a useless trait, a weakness, but (and this was a whole new way of thinking) _she didn't think that meant she was useless_.

On the contrary…Anko thought…of course not that she could be the greatest shinobi ever, that was quite the joke… but she thought she could be_respected _and even _feared_ by everyone in the village? Hinata knew experienced shinobi chose their words carefully and considered every possible meaning. She meant _everyone_?

Even her classmates?

Jounin?

Neji?

The Hokage?

Her Father?

That was… a lot to take in. She put it in the back of her mind. She would process it some other time. And then the thought occurred to her.

Did she want that?

Did she want to be respected?

_Yes!_

Did she want to be feared?

…_._

She didn't know how to feel about that. If she could allow herself to have a free flight of fancy and imagine people cowering before her power (like that would ever happen) she… wasn't really into power trips. But it would be nice… to have that ability. Not to use it all the time, just in case … you know … it could come in handy, she guessed.

Anko watched her, watched every little muscle movement, every body posture, every facial contortion, lip movement, movement of the eyes, perspiration, blood flow to the skin. Together she put together a picture, and with accuracy gained from years in interrogation Anko knew in great detail what was going on in her student's mind. She loved fucking with the little genin, the little things were so innocent and easy to manipulate.

Using her skills to try to help someone as opposed to break them however was a new thing for her. She found it wasn't entirely to her disliking. Though she would ask Ibiki if she could torture someone later.

She thought it was about time to seal the deal. "Not many people like me Hinata," she said, breaking the girl out of her reverie, "but they fear me. And thus they respect me. Fear and respect are two sides of the same coin in the shinobi world. If you fear someone, are afraid they could be dangerous even if you are convinced you can beat them, then they will respect you. You will be treated well by everyone that is not your enemy. If you respect someone, in the world of shinobi it is only because of strength. The measure of a shinobi is strength and power,"

"Now, there are some exceptions to this of course. Med-nins for example are highly respected in the ninja world. But if you want the recognition of your clan, and your father, and of most shinobi, the only way is with strength, since that is all they really value, aside from honor and all that horseshit," Hinata gasped a little, never having heard of her clan honor and standing so casually referred to as _horseshit_, but Anko continued, "but what I want for you is bigger than your clan, though you can do what you want with that,"

"I'm not going to get into details, but there was once a man that was like a father to me. I worshipped him, and he taught me most of what I know," Anko turned her head to the side, the sad look on her face genuine for once, and she did not hide it because she wanted her student to see it, "He was my world. He was my universe. I fought for him. I killed for him. I would have given my life for him," she paused for a moment, lost in memories. Hinata looked on in rapt attention. A part of Anko saw it, confirmed things were going to plan, and continued,

"In the end, after a while, he changed. His priorities changed. He became obsessed with power, and with immortality. Things he used to care about he ceased to care about. People," she stopped, and took a deep steadying breath, almost no theater needed in this case, "he cared about became instruments to further his goals. Other people he cared about became obstacles to his goals. In the end he regarded everything in utilitarian terms, even the little girl he had said he thought of as a little sister."

Anko paused. Hinata did not know what to do or say, so she just sat there, waiting for her to continue. She idly wondered if the little girl Anko was talking about was herself. Somehow, painfully, in the back of Hinata's mind, this story seemed to hit close to home.

"When I no longer could further his ambitions, he told me in no uncertain terms how deficient I was, and that he had grown bored with me and had no further use for me." No tears ran down her cheeks, but some reason Hinata felt like the woman was crying, like they were there but just invisible to even her eyes. Anko stopped, then continued,

"It took me a long time, and some help, to realize that what he thought of me didn't define who I was. In the end I think the biggest lesson was that you can't let the whims of others dictate what you think about yourself and who you are. It's good to let people you find trustworthy close, but it's not good to let them define who you are. That should be left up to you. Sometimes it can be hard to keep what people think and what you choose to think about yourself apart. And with you, I can see it is all fucked up,"

Hinata blushed a little at this, and wondered why she didn't feel bad at being called all fucked up, but she kept her silence, listening to her teacher standing over her.

"So I want to make you into a fucking badass, and help you decide who you want to be. I expect you to be heavily influenced by me, I'd be disappointed if you weren't and maybe a bit insulted quite frankly, and I'm going to do my best to turn you into a dangerous pit viper. I'm going to turn you into me, as much as our clashing personality types will allow, and once you are strong enough to stand up to your family you can decide just what brand of crazy you want to be," she took a deep breath.

"I'm asking you to trust me Hinata. When I say you can do it, I want you to believe me. It's hard, and it's a lot of trust, but that is the only real way a true student and sensei relationship can work. And… that's all I have to say!" she suddenly turned from her serious voice to a higher pitched and cheery voice, and it slapped Hinata out of the trance like attention she had been giving the woman, "and no, you don't have to answer me, that would too awkward for you! Kurenai arranged it so you'll go to her place and you can tell her whatever you want to say. Unless you tell her not to share I'll hear about it later anyways."

She smiled down at the girl (who was still reeling from all the going ons in the last several minues), and it wasn't a nice smile, "Now let's get back to work." She was sure her manipulation had worked. Now it was just a waiting game.

Anko started going through her pouches, and produced two scrolls, one of them very large and the other one much smaller. She threw them at Hinata, who caught them, still in mid shock, trying to absorb and digest everything that had been transpired in the last few minutes. It might have been why she asked lamely a few seconds later, "Um… what are these?"

The Special Jounin however did not jump on her shit. See, she did have SOME compassion. Instead she said, "Scrolls. Read the bigger one first. The big one is Fuinjutsu fundamentals. The smaller one is a surprise, but you only get to read the surprise if you read the other scroll first." She said with a mischievous wink. "If you're going to study with me, have them read and memorized by next week. They are yours to keep in any case."

"Um… t-thank you sensei." Hinata said. She knew she was being odd, still feeling like she had information overload, bust still got a thankful smile on her face for her teacher.

"Yea, no problem Hina-chan. Now, let's talk about how we are going to increase you chakra reserves." Anko pulled yet another scroll from somewhere in her cloak. Hinata wondered if that cloak was really practical and mobile in combat. She assumed it was, since she took it everywhere, and she seemed to be able to carry copious amounts of stuff in it. Maybe an idea?

The Special Jounin spread the scroll out on the floor. It was the same scroll from that morning, Hinata recognized the same color and markings and the whole fifteen foot length. After kneeling down and putting some of her chakra into it, again hundreds of kunai came out.

"Now Hina-chan," Anko began. "There are two hundred and twenty kunai in this scroll, now all laid out here on the ground. Try putting back as many as you can. As fast as you can."

Hinata scooted over to the large scroll, pushed some of the kunai to the side so the symbols underneath were exposed. She noticed that in this scroll there was not a circle, but instead a large rectangular outline running the length of it. There were many more small symbols (kanji?) drawn along the length of the rectangle. Some she recognized as the same as the other eight, and others were quite different.

She began at the end, and grabbed one kunai. It went much the same as the first one, except she had to expend a lot more chakra to activate the whole scroll and get the kunai to sink into it. Then she grabbed the next, and repeated the process.

By the time she finished her tenth, she was starting to feel the strain. It did take some chakra to perform. Sweat started to bead down her body and Hinata's heart rate started to climb. Her breathing rate started to increase. But she was going to keep doing it until she couldn't do it anymore.

She was trying to seal her twenty first kunai when she was unable to finish it. The kunai just harmlessly popped back on onto the paper, and she herself fell down on all fours, breathing hard from the exertion.

"That's about your limit kid, twenty kunai" said Anko as she stood over Hinata. "So you have some reference, I can seal all two hundred and twenty into the seal. And even then I won't be anywhere near my limit. So what does that tell you about our difference in chakra?" Asked Anko.

Hinata breathed hard, and thought about it. She may not be strong, but she was smart and quick minded (when she wasn't crippled by some form of being self conscious). That she could do 20 and her sensei over 220 meant that her sensei had at least 11 times the amount of chakra she had.

"Sensei," she said while sucking wind, but her breathing was slowing, "it means your chakra reserves are more than 11 times mine."

Anko smiled, "Actually, they are quite a bit bigger than that, but it'd be stupid for a shinobi to go around telling everyone just how much chakra they have, now wouldn't it?" but then she got a serious tone. "However, it's not just a one to one equivalent with sealing kunai. My chakra control is also incredibly better than yours, so it takes less chakra for me to seal a kunai in the scroll than it does you. That also goes for performing any jutsu,"

"So, as I'm sure you are aware, the more you use your chakra the faster it grows. What you may not know is that the fastest natural way to get your chakra to increase is to use it to exhaustion, like you just did right now. The more you do that, the faster your chakra reserves will grow,"

Hinata didn't like the sound of that… she didn't feel really good right now, forcing yourself to use just about all your chakra was not a pleasant feeling.

"That means Hina-chan, twice a day, once in the morning and once in the afternoon, I'm going to unseal this scroll and you're going to put all the kunai back into it," Hinata had to fight the urge to groan, "and that will build your chakra reserves. In the morning I'll leave a few minutes for you to do this, so the focus then will be to do it as fast as you can until exhaustion. In the evening you're just going to sit here and not get your ass up until you seal every last kunai back into the scroll." Anko had a positively evil look on her face. Hinata shuddered.

_If the girl is lucky she'll be able to get them all back in the scroll in under three hours,_ thought Anko. _Pushing yourself and then taking small breaks and then pushing yourself to use you chakra over and over again feels like shit and mildly like torture. Haha I guess training does let me have some of that old fashioned fun again after all. And it is the fastest way to safely build up her chakra reserves, which she will desperately need for what I have in store for her._

"Well, that's it kid," Anko said to the young Hyuuga, "when you get done here, roll up those two scrolls" she motioned to the two open ones on the floor, "and bring them with you in the morning. If you're not coming you can just give them to Kurenai. Go to her house after this. If you take the road from the Hokage monument west it's about three quarters of a mile. It's the red one on the right with all the plants everywhere."

The Special Jounin finished, and it was clear she was about to go. The tired Hinata felt it was her duty though, so she got to her feet slowly and bowed to her still temporary sensei, "Um… t-thank you for everything Anko-sensei."

Almost instantly Hinata felt cut deep into her neck. A kunai had been thrown at her, from the front, and on instinct the girl straightened up and got ready to fight…

Only to feel a hand grab her hair and another grab her shoulder from behind on the same side as her new ugly cut, and yanked her head and shoulder apart, hard. Hinata had a second to register how exposed her neck was when she felt teeth bite down over the wound.

Behind her, a leg pushed her hips forward until she was horribly off balance, and the only thing holding her up were the hands of her hair and shoulder and her back against someone's chest. She could still move her hands, she realized, but she wasn't about to attack a Jounin, even a Special Jounin. And she was so badly off balance she couldn't pull or twist away.

So she just stood there, scared, not sure what to think, as the mouth on her neck started working. The mouth on her neck starting sucking on the wound, greedily sucking as much blood as it could out of the fresh injury.

The teeth started to bite down, hard, and the sucking on her neck got more desperate and intense. It also started to hurt. It hurt a lot actually, and before long the teeth started breaking more skin, the sucking was widening the previous cut. Her whole neck started to go numb and tingly. It was one of the most unpleasant physical experiences she could remember having, having her neck sucked and mauled while she just stood there, out of balance and knowing it would be stupid to fight back. It hurt worse than it had a right to.

Hinata almost laughed when she thought that this was probably the most romantic moment she had ever had with anyone, despite the fact she was in horrible pain. She was pretty freaked out, but part of her mind in the back was saying that in a romantic situation she would probably enjoy being the one being bitten rather than the one doing the biting.

Not that this was anything close to a romantic situation.

Anko stood there for another minute, mauling the girl and drinking her blood, until tears were streaming out of the girls eyes. It really was one of the worse things she had had to endure, and she had received severe beatings and nerve strikes while training with her family plenty of times before.

Eventually, after what seemed like an eternity, the older woman pulled away but firmly held the back of her neck with her hand. The Hyuuga could see the woman's other hand come up to her wound, and soon her hand was glowing green, like it had done when the woman had healed her that very same morning (was that still just the same day?). However, this time, the pain didn't dissipate. She felt the wounds closing, but she was going to have some painful bruising on her neck for days to come.

After she was done, Anko pulled her hand away the wound, examining her neck. The older woman however still held a firm grip on the back of her neck.

"That was for forgetting my instructions, silly girl," she said in a cheery and husky voice. "Next time you break one of my rules, I won't go quite so easy on you." She lowered her head so her mouth was right next to Hinata's ear. "You have tasty pretty blood by the way Hina-chan," she said happily, "I think all your punishments from now on will be so I can spill your blood and drink it. Bye!"

With that the Special Jounin let go of Hinata's neck. Then right afterwards she felt a spinning of wind and a rustling of leaves, indicating a Shunshin no Jutsu. Her sensei was gone.

Hinata thought about what she did wrong, wondering what had set her sensei off. She quickly spotted it. She had called her Anko-sensei, as opposed to Anko or sensei. That had been her instruction, and she had been punished, and gotten off easy according to her sensei. She sighed. Well, it wasn't like she wasn't used to screwing up.

At least these punishments only seemed to hurt her body. It really wasn't that bad, compared to what her father tended to do when she displeased him. She would take this any day over her father.

She sighed again, and fell down next to the large scroll with all the kunai scattered everywhere. It had been weird, but it hadn't been as bad as it could have been, and she didn't want to think about it right now. She had a long afternoon of sealing kunai in front of her. It would more than likely be dark by the time she finished. But that was ok. She was a Hyuuga. She could see in the dark.

000

It had taken her about three and a half hours to finish sealing all 220 kunai back into the scroll. She was absolutely exhausted, her neck throbbing, as she made her way to Kurenai's house. Hinata was also starving, too. She needed to get to bed soon, or else she didn't know how she was going to get up at quarter past four in the morning the next day.

It was almost a full moon out, it would be in a few days, so there was plenty of light to walk. The road west of the Hokage monument led her outside the city walls after about half the distance she had been told by Anko-sens…err better to just start thinking of her as Anko or sensei.

She was surprised because it was rare that a shinobi live outside the walls of Konoha. The gate guard questioned her, she said she needed to go to her sensei's house, and after giving her sensei's name (he said he knew she lived down the street) the guard let her through without a problem. Hinata was good at observing people, and by the way the guard's body reacted when she mentioned Kurenai she was pretty sure the man had a huge crush on her Jounin-sensei.

Eventually she came to a place where there were small houses on either side of the road. They were small, and spaced far apart so each had plenty of yard giving it a feeling of privacy even though you had other neighbors within eyesight. All of the houses were well kept and neat.

Almost at the end, she saw the house. It was there on the right, just as sensei had said it would be, and it was overflowing with plants. On the small red porch were at least a dozen plants on hanging pots. Some of them had flowers, some did not, and they all looked very well taken care of. Hinata walked up the porch, all of a sudden a little self conscious to be knocking on her sensei's house in the night.

Still, she had been told to do it. She gathered her courage and knocked on the door.

A few seconds later, she heard the locks being undone, and her sensei opened the door. Hinata had to keep herself from gasping.

It's not that she was wearing anything out of the ordinary. Just a dark red tank top and a pair of sturdy looking dark sweat pants. But her hair was washed and combed and her forhead protector was gone. But the clothes she wore seemed to hug her body like it had been custom made to accentuate her curves and her figure. She just looked so… different in civilian wear. In her mind she knew her sensei was pretty and sought after by different men, everywhere they went she turned heads. But for some reason it wasn't until now that it registered how stunningly beautiful Kurenai-sensei really was.

Kurenai noticed this reaction by Hinata, and was slightly amused by it. She knew Hinata wouldn't be intimidated by her looks like so many other women (and men) were, so it didn't really bother her.

Kurenai looked the girl over, up and down. She looked like hell.

"Come in Hinata." She said in a friendly voice, opening the door wider and walking back inside.

Hinata entered. The immediate area she saw was the living room, with a small kitchen at the end, and a door beyond that that she assumed was a bedroom. The living room walls were painted a dark red, and there was single coffee table in the middle of the living room with two couches positioned around it. The floors were wood, and there were rugs placed in different places. A few plants on shelves, and a single lamp on the coffee table. Overall, it was a really cozy place.

"Would you like some tea Hinata?" called Kurenai over from the kitchen.

"Um.. yes. Thank you Kurenai-sensei." She replied.

"Have a seat, I'll be right with you."

Hinata did as she was told, sitting on the edge of what seemed to be an old, but very comfortable, reddish brown leather couch. She then leaned back, and sitting back on the couch made her realize just how totally exhausted she was.

A few minutes passed, and Kurenai came over with a tray she put on the coffee table. It had a tea pot and two cups, and the red eyed Jounin poured herself and her student. Kurenai picked up her cup with the little plate underneath, and Hinata followed suit.

"Um.. thank you."

Kurenai smiled at her charge as she sipper her tea. "You're welcome."

They sat in silence for a few minutes enjoying the tea. It was nice, not an uncomfortable silence that can happen with people you don't know that well. Eventually, after they were both relaxed some, Kurenai spoke,

"So, what did you think of your first day?"

Very open ended question. Hinata answered it as best she could, "Well, exhausting that is mostly what I'm feeling right now. I…I like our team. I t-think, you know, it will work out fine," Hinata started fidgeting nervously, and Kurenai just watched her as she waited for the girl to continue, "It… it was an odd day. The mission wasn't so bad. T-the t-training was hard. So… um… yea, I guess that's how it went."

They paused for a minute as they drank a bit more of their tea. Then Kurenai continued, with a kind and amused smile on her face, "So what did you think of Anko?"

Hinata had been expecting this, but she still wasn't really sure what to say. So she just winged it and hoped she didn't look bad or offend either of her senseis… there really wasn't anything else she could do about it at this point. "Umm… she, um… she seems like… a really good teacher… s-she is a b-bit… o-odd? … she scares me a bit… but, I think she's a good person… I got that i-impression…so yea…"

Kurenai for her part was amused as the girl tried to describe Anko's personality without seeming like she was degrading the woman. The older woman had to admit, she had done it with a good deal of tact.

But she needed to get down to business.

"Well, Hinata, I guess there is no more use beating around the bush. You need to decide if you want to do this training and take Anko as your sensei. If you do, she will have as much influence and control over you as I will, except for missions and other official business like that. Now, are there any concerns you would like to bring up before we go any further?" at this point Kurenai had already noticed the bad bruising on her neck. It didn't look like a hickie, but she had some idea how that had probably happened.

Hinata however shook her head. "No, Kurenai -sensei. Anko-san is … very strict, a-and training i-is r-rough. She has… I-I think… unusual methods for d-discipline," Kurenai raised her eyebrow at that. She'd have to mention to her not to say it like that in public, though the girl probably wouldn't know why. "But… you… told me she w-wouldn't kill me … and I trust you Kurenai-sensei," Kurenai was actually really happy to hear that, "And… well… I-I think I can take it."

To be honest, though, Hinata did not know if she could take it. Take the training. But she knew she wanted to try. It would feel, not it _would be_like quitting if she did not at least try to give it her best. If she failed, fine, but she wouldn't quit without a fight. She really wanted this training, she needed it she knew. This was a huge opportunity, and she knew it. She also… kind of liked sensei. Though she couldn't really be sure why.

Kurenai wasn't as good at reading people as Anko was, but even she could tell the girl wasn't all that sure about what she had said about being able to handle the training. But if she wanted to try it, that was really good in and of itself. She sure as heck wasn't going to deny her the opportunity.

The Jounin smiled kindly at her student, and said "Well, you've said what you think will be challenging about the training. What about why you want to do it Hinata? I mean, what about Anko makes you want to be her apprentice?"

Hinta thought for a minute, then said, "Anko-san is um… unusual sensei but… she um…s-she I think r-really believes I can do w-whatever s-she asks me t-to… and… she doesn't t-treat me like I'm worthless… o-or think that I'm worthless? I-I think. And,… yea…" Hinata did not really want to mention some of the other things, about how she was hungrily craving praise from this person she did not know. Though if she was honest with herself the biggest reason she wanted to continue was because Anko made her feel good about herself. In the sense that Anko pushed her, and when she did well she had said it. She didn't seem to expect her to be perfect. All that was too embarrassing for her to say however, so she kept quiet.

Not that she would not have stuck with it if that had not been the case. But, it would have been more of swallowing a bitter pill than something she (sort of) was really anxious to do.

Still, it was not hard for Kurenai to read between the lines. She was inwardly pleased that the girl had taken so well to her friend (at least so far). The Jounin had had her doubts about the seemingly meek Hinata being able to handle the loud mouth Special Jounin, but she had proven to be made from sterner stuff than any of them had given her credit for (including herself).

Kurenai began, "so then, are you sure you want to do this? Remember, once it is done there is no going back. You will be tied to Anko and she will have command over you, she will be in charge of your training and all your time outside of home, time with your team and missions she will have the final say so. At least until you are fifteen, when you are an adult (under clan rules, slightly different set of laws). Are you sure you are ready to commit to that?"

To be honest, Hinata was not. It felt scary, it was scary. Anko was a scary woman, and she didn't know if things would just get worse with the training. And she afraid of what would happen, or if she would hate it. But Hinata also knew she was in a difficult position. With her father, her clan, and with what she wanted to do and what she hoped would happen. Recognition from her clan, her father… to be treated as an equal, without the never ending dismissive tones, disappointed or scornful gazes, without the coldness or emotional brutality and roller coasters, without Neji's constant polite deriding of her and critizising her skills… she just really wanted a family again. Like she had when her mother was still alive. Like before Neji's father died.

So, she would do this. She didn't know what the future held, but she knew Anko would help her get what she needed… she needed to be strong to get her family back. Hinata had faith in that, that Anko would help her get strong, like her father wanted. And she… well, she liked the woman. She wasn't bad… she didn't know why she felt that way, she was sure her team wouldn't see it that way… but she for some reason, she felt confident of that fact.

So, what she said was, "Y-Yes Kurenai-sensei. Please make it official with A-Anko-san." She said, bowing her head like a polite bow from her seated position.

Kurenai just nodded. "Very well Hinata. By tomorrow morning it will be finalized, so when you meet Anko in the morning she will be legally in charge of you… along with me and your father of course." She smiled playfully at the young genin, "now, get home you. You need to get to sleep. And oh, I would recommend either wearing those clothes again tomorrow morning or pick out a few outfits that you choose for destruction. She will just keep ruining your clothes if you keep wearing a new outfit with her every morning. Just make sure to change into something that is in one piece before you come meet your team in the morning."

Hinata got the hint (and blushed a little), stood up and bowed to her sensei politely, "Ano… t-thank you for everything Kurenai-sensei." She said.

The Jounin waved her off, "No problem Hinata. It was my pleasure. Just doing what I can to look out for one of my precious students. Now get going you." She smiled at the young girl reassuringly.

With that Hinata bowed once more (she is very polite), turned and walked out the door.

Kurenai sat on her couch and poured herself some more tea, stretching out her senses so she could feel where Hinata was. After a half minute, when she was sure the girl was far enough down the road, she said, "You know, it's considered very rude to eavesdrop on other people's conversations. I should keep her to myself and reprimand you. You are not exactly setting a good example for the younger generation."

There was nothing for a second as Kurenai sipper her tea demurely, then a woman in a beige trench coat jumped through the open window and landed on her living room.

"Can you really blame me Kurenai-chan? How else am I supposed to know what the brat thinks about me? Important tool for teaching you know." She said with a teasing tone, as she spun on her heel and plopped herself down on the couch next to Kurenai.

The elder woman said, "You know, you could have just asked her if you wanted to know Anko."

"Hehe yea right. I didn't feel like subjecting myself to a round of shy stuttering thank you very much. I still haven't gotten that out of her yet." Anko said.

"And it would ruin your tough bad ass reputation if you went around asking about people's feelings about you?" Kurenai said with a teasing smile over the rim of her tea cup.

The snake Jounin shrugged. "Can't have people think I'm getting soft or anything. Besides, I wouldn't be much of an interrogator and expert on the mind if I can't figure it out on my own. Or should that fail, I can use my espionage and infiltration skills to find out."

"Like you did just now?" Kurenai said in a chiding tone.

"Naw, I was just being lazy. And it was kind of fun spying on you," She said with a goofy smile.

Kurenai rolled her eyes, "you're lucky she didn't have reason to activate her Byakugan. I had half a mind to ask her to. You would have looked quite silly huddled outside my window," Anko was about to protest when Kurenai stood up, "let me go get those papers, before I change my mind." With that she walked off into one of the back rooms.

In a few minutes Kurenai was back. Anko watched as she filled out some forms, scribbled some things here and there and then at the bottom. Then she turned the papers over to her and handed her a pen.

"I took care of everything, I'll give you a few copies once it is done. Sign here at the bottom next to my name, and you are now in charge of Hinata's training. She'll be all yours then." Said Kurenai, voice carefully steady.

Anko just looked at it a minute, then looked up at her friend, "Um… thanks Yuhi. I um… appreciate it. I know you wanted this kid to yourself."

Kurenai smiled slightly up at her friend, "You're starting to sound like Hinata Anko. It's what's best for her, I know that. If I wanted an apprentice I could have gotten one instead of taking a team. I'm happy with what I'm doing. And it's not like I'll never see the girl again. You'll take good care of her, won't you?" she said with a very slight pleading voice, in a very un-Kunrenai like fashion.

Anko looked up and tapped her finger to her chin as if contemplating. "Well, I can almost guarantee she will survive. Hmmm I'm not so sure about being maimed, and I know sooner or later she will get an injury that will scar even with healing. Her face is too pretty, she'll need some scars on it. You know how it goes, I'll try to push her right to the breaking point… if she goes over, I'll make sure to visit her at the hospital at least one time. She might need you for psychological debriefings though, or she may end up committing suicide inside of a few months. Constant Stress And Fear Of Death Syndrome or something like that Ibiki calls it."

Kurenai sighed, "Why do I even ask? Here smartass. Sign."

Anko reached over and signed on the indicated places. Then she signed a couple of other papers she was told were copies. Then Kurenai handed her two of them.

"For you to keep. Congratulations, you now officially have an apprentice. And I still mean it Anko, you kill this girl I'm not going to be your friend anymore." She said in a serious tone.

"Yea, yea whatever Yuhi. I love you too." She said with a smile from ear to ear.

Kurenai sighed again, "You know, she said she thought you were a good person. Are you going to go out of your way to prove her wrong?"

"She did say that," mused Anko, "and I just think that means I haven't been training her hard enough. But don't worry, we'll change that." Her smile, if possible, got even bigger. Kurenai just shook her head. She just hoped Hinata didn't end up hating both of them when this was all over. The Jounin kind of doubted that would happen though.

000

Hinata arrived at the gates of her home at almost 9 at night. She was exhausted, and dragging her feet. The gate guards spared her looks of slight surprise at the condition of her clothes, but did not question or challenge her. They were branch members, it wouldn't be their place anyway.

Her father had probably retired for the night or was finishing up training Hanabi. She worried about seeing Neji as well, but the branch members quarters were on the other side of the complex, so there was little danger of seeing him. Hinata scurried through the halls, afraid of encountering anyone who would stop her and talk to her. Whenever anyone wanted to talk to her, it was usually not a good experience. Though very few of the members of the family actually ever stopped to do that.

She made her way to her room, and slid inside quiet as a cat. Hinata took her clothes off, thinking of just running right into the bathroom, when she stopped and looked at herself in the mirror on her dresser. Her neck was black and ugly, and it hurt when she touched it or moved her head. The rest of her body had small red lines across it. Apparently the cuts had healed fine, but it still left a red mark behind she had not noticed before.

Hinata started looking at her breasts and figure before she got shy, and blushing ran into the bathroom. She wasn't very comfortable looking at her naked body. If she was such a failure, her body really couldn't be much better either, she figured.

After a hot shower and a new set of clothes, Hinata realized she was starving. Too much energy used in one day. She left her room and scurried about, terrified of running into anyone. Once she made it to the kitchen, she felt somewhat safe because her father or sister would not go into the kitchen, that was something for servants to do. She found a large loaf of bread and some cheese, which she took in her hands and ran back to her room with.

Sitting on her bed, she ate her bread and cheese, and it suddenly occurred to her how miserable it was to be having to hide and scurry through her own home for fear of meeting her family. She wished she could be glad to see her father or sister (or her cousin Neji), but that wasn't how it worked right now. Hinata was glad she could hide away in her room.

She finished eating, brushed her teeth and got into bed. She was about to turn off the light when she realized she probably needed to start reading the big scroll her sensei had given her.

_Sensei. I'm now an official apprentice. Learning from someone outside the family._Part of her just couldn't get her head around all the ramifications of what was going on. She would have to finish sorting it out another day.

She pulled out the scroll, opened it and started reading. Basic Fuinjutsu. She quickly scanned the scroll over. It was the most common symbols, most common patterns, theory of what each symbol can do and the basics of how they interact with each other. How they interact with chakra. How the symbols use chakra as a medium between seals and physical objects. How chakra can be sealed, how seals can be used to release things differently than how they went in, in theory.

The scroll was much theory but the only "how to" stuff was how to seal just about anything into a scroll. She was surprised to see you could even seal a person into a scroll, though it was a complicated task to draw the correct seals on to a scroll to do it. Hinata had to say, she really liked the subject. It was useful but not directly related to combat, but even if it wasn't it was still an invaluable tool for shinobi. Something about that appealed to her, and she thought it was really neat. She would have to ask her sensei more about it when the time was right.

She would read it in detail starting the next day, she had to learn it as her sensei had said. _I can't believe I have a Jounin as a sensei._ For now Hinata put the scroll away and turned off the light.

She was excited about her new training, even if it was scary, savage and unpredictable… it was still kind of exciting, in a way. Her last thoughts were hoping she wouldn't see her father in the morning, and she went to sleep a little easier knowing that she probably would not.


	5. Anko's TLC

**A/N:** I am sorry for taking so long in updating. Things got in the way, but for at least the next few chapters I expect I will be updating much sooner than the gap between my last update and this one.

I want to say, thank you to everyone that has reviewed, and thank you to everyone that has read. Like for many authors, reader reviews and seeing that I get people reading my story is a big motivation to keep on writing (hint hint) to get those updates up.

But seriously, I thank everyone for reading. Please review, I want to hear what you liked about the story, what you don't like, and what you think I could have maybe done better.

Without further delays, here is Chapter 5 of White Snake.

000

_One Week Later_

Hinata ran through the woods, her Byakugan activated, panting and out of breath. She had quickly found out that holding her ground and relying on her Byakugan was a bad idea. The attacks would somehow come from all angles at once, so even if she could see the weapons she couldn't dodge or block them all at once. She wasn't sure how her pursuer could set up to do that so quickly, so _soon_ every time after Hinata stopped moving.

As she ran she felt her foot trip something… she relaxed her eyes as she ran so she could see in all directions much better. From behind her right under the earth, the trap sprung and a dozen shiruken came out of the ground straight at her. Hinata jumped sideways, but one of the shiruken still cut her shoulder, biting in deep.

She ignored it. She had learned really quickly that getting cut wasn't going to get her any breaks. In fact, the mysterious figure in the shadows usually used that time to launch an especially vicious attack.

Hinata landed in a crouch, and before her feet really settled six kunai came flying at her from up in the trees in front. They were aimed high at her, she took a split second to decide what to do and she dove forward. The blades came too close for comfort, one of them she felt cut the cloth of her hoodie as she dove past.

She was still halfway through her forward roll when she saw three kunai coming at her… one from the behind, one from the left and one from the right, all at the same time.

_How does she do that?!_ She screamed mentally as her Byakugan saw the knives coming at her at high speed.

She hesitated as she came to a crouch, and the knives came at her so fast the only thing she could do in time was drop down flat on her stomach. The three kunai hit each other a few inches over her, one of them ricocheting and cutting her cheek.

The Hyuuga was now in a bad position, she was flat on her belly and she knew more knives were coming. She rolled to her back and pulled out a kunai of her own. As soon as she turned she saw a figure had just appeared high above her, the figure hidden by the brightness of the sun right behind it. Hinata brought her kunai in front of her instinctively in a defensive posture. The figure above her wasted no time, and in a split second a dozen kunai were raining down on her.

Still flat on her back, Hinata panicked. There was no way she could block a dozen kunai flat on her back with the one kunai she held in front of her. Hinata desperately rolled to one side trying to get away from the incoming barrage. However she was not fast enough. Hinata grimaced in pain as two kunai imbedded themselves on the back of her right arm as she rolled away from the onslaught.

Hinata sprung to her feet and pulled out the two kunai from her arm in one swift motion, though it almost took her back to her knees due to the sudden sharp pain it caused. She vaguely noticed that now that she knew she could be healed quickly without any problems, getting stabbed by kunai didn't seem to bother her all that much. After a week of this she was sort of getting used to it (getting stabbed and cut). It seemed kind of morbid, but since there was little consequence at the end of the day (other than soreness) there was no real reason to get really worked up about it.

Besides, it's not like she could stop it even if she wanted it to. Which, she didn't. Hinata was used to pain when training with her family, and this wasn't all that different. At least that's what she told herself.

Hinata just stood there, and she realized the kunai had finally stopped coming. _She must be out, _she though. _I probably have another half minute before she picks up all the kunai in the forest and starts at it again. _Hinata tried to move her right arm experimentally. She instantly felt a sharp ripping pain, and decided it would be best if she kept her arm still. The arm was bleeding profusely, staining her sleeve to the point where it would soon start to become over-saturated. The kunai must have hit some minor arteries. She was losing a lot of blood. Hinata sighed. That's what blood replacement pills were for. Those things always left her with a queasy feeling in her stomach after.

Hinata put away the kunai she had drawn and put pressure on her arm with her other hand as best as she could. The bleeding slowed, but it must be a pretty serious injury to be bleeding like it was. She was already starting to feel slightly light headed. Idly she wondered if sensei would make her continue to train like this until she passed out. She felt a little depressed at the thought, and to be honest it was a good possibility.

So Hinata was relieved when her sensei appeared in front of her twenty seconds later. The woman never showed herself unless they were taking a break or they were done. Her coat was hanging heavily off of her, she had obviously gone to retrieve the kunai and had a good number of them in her coat. The woman looked at Hinata curiously as she studied her.

"You really suck at this game, you know that?" said Anko, as she studied her new apprentice with one hand under her breasts and another stroking her chin in thought.

Hinata felt a familiar sting of shame and guilt at that comment, but it was thankfully less intense than before when they had first started. She knew sensei didn't think _she_ wasn't any good, only her performance right now. Only that she though Hinata could do better. Hinata's first instinct was to deny it and doubt herself, insist she really couldn't do it, but she stopped herself from thinking those thoughts. She had agreed to trust sensei, she had to trust her sensei, and if sensei said she could, she could. That was all she allowed herself to think, though underneath the familiar stirrings of worthlessness and feelings of uselessness still lingered.

"You're still not listening to me Hina-chan," said Anko with a small undercurrent of anger and annoyance in her voice. This made Hinata shudder and take a small step back involuntarily. "You think before you act. That is fine when strategizing, when making a plan, or before attacking. But once you are in the _shit_, you can't use your mind to decide what you want to do. It's just too slow. It causes you to hesitate. You have to _act_ Hinata, let your body move on its own without the filters of your brain shooting up to mess you up. Do you understand?" asked Anko irritably.

"H-Hai sensei…"said Hinata, thinking that she _kind_ of understood what her sensei was getting at, though to be honest she still wasn't really getting it (duh). She wasn't about to tell that to an irritated Jounin though.

"Good!" said Anko sweetly, in one of the strange changes in demeanor that still caught Hinata off guard. The woman could go from fire breathing demon to sweet and playful in an eyeblink. It was really disorienting.

Anko turned around to walk away. Hinata looked down at the ground, starting to think about what her sensei had said, a little flustered that sensei had not healed her arm right away. As soon as Hinata's guard was down, Anko swirled around to face her. Dramatically, she raised her right hand in the air as she spun and brought it down towards Hinata's face.

The young Hyuuga saw it coming. She was about to move, but she hesitated. _She's my sensei, maybe I should let her hit me, she's a Jounin, I want to avoid it what would be the appropriate response, _All this flashed through Hinata's head in a fraction of a heartbeat. In the end she began to move and half put her good arm in front of her face to absorb some of the impact, unable to do much else.

The blow was slow but it was jarring. Hinata's head whipped around from the blow and she fell on the floor a few feet away. Her jaw and face were stinging, on fire and in pain. If she hadn't brought up her arm to at least partially deflect the blow, Hinata was sure some of the bones on her face would have at least some minor fractures.

"Stand up girl. I'm going to beat this into you today if it kills you. Get up!" demanded an angry Anko. Hinata for her part was really terrified. She had never seen sensei really angry before. The girl was understandably very frightened about what would happen next.

Shakily Hinata got to her feet, her face throbbing, her arm in serious renewed pain from the impact of the fall and starting to get a little more light headed. Anko walked right in front of her and looked her in the eye.

"React. No brain involved. We're going to stay here until you do. Sooner or later you will learn to let go, and trust your body to do what it needs to do." Said the Special Jounin, no longer angry but uncharacteristically serious for her. Any change in demeanor at this point made Hinata nervous, and right now they kept coming fast and furious. She was getting _very_ nervous.

Hinata stood there for a second, unsure of what to do next, when sensei's hand came out of nowhere and slapped her in the face, hard. It was her left cheek, the same as before, and it hurt like hell. But it wasn't hard enough to knock her down, she just stumbled, a little numb by the repeated jarring to her brain.

"Straighten up brat." Said Anko in a voice that left no room for argument. Hinata did as she was told, though somewhat slowly. She wasn't sure where sensei was headed with this. It seemed to Hinata that this was a little much, it didn't seem like training. She was unsure what to think of this, but straightened herself out as best she could. She was determined to do whatever her sensei told her to, even if she wasn't sure what was going on.

Again, the hand came at her. This time she saw it, she became aware of it a split second before it slapped her face again, but Hinata was too slow to react. Again the compound hit made the pain in her face even worse this time, some of the pain seeming to go into her left eye. What was the point of this? Hinata was starting to feel a little bit of panic welling up inside of her.

"You need to be fast enough to react to that. And the only way to do that is to let go of the inhibitions in your brain Hina-chan." Said the snake woman in a voice that was serious and surprisingly concerned in Hinata's eyes. The young girl straightened up, and not a second later Anko's hand came up to slap her face a third time.

Hinata saw it coming, expecting it this time. But this time Anko moved her hand much faster than before, with a speed Hinata had not been expecting. Her left arm was barely starting its way up to block when Anko's hand connected. The open hand slap was much worse this time, she felt like her brain was jarring around inside her head. The blow was so strong that she fell down to one knee. Hinata held her check gently, afraid to touch it as she knelt dizzily and disoriented. She thought some of her teeth were coming loose or were going to get knocked out.

Hinata looked up slightly, just in time to see Anko looming over her and her hand coming down to slap her in the face again. And again, Hinata was too slow to really react. She tried to twist away, and did manage it to some extent, but most of the blow still caught her. This time she fell flat on the ground, the pain on her face and head going to intolerable levels. Tears streamed down her face. She felt weak because of the blood loss. Her head spun, and she felt like she might throw up. She just laid there in the ground for a minute, making no move to get up.

Anko sighed, suddenly wondering why she hadn't predicted that training someone could be such a headache. She had been trying for a week to get the girl to overcome this _huge_ mental block of hers. It was the same trap that many beginning shinobi fell in to, she had observed, and Hinata seemed to have it with a vengeance.

It was a clear symptom of people who trusted their brains more than their bodies. Training teaches the body what to do, just how real life and schooling teach the brain how to think. When the person does not trust their body, they subconsciously have their mind take over. And the mind is never as fast as the body in responding to an external threat. There just isn't enough time to think about what to do and then do it. You just had to trust your body to act and react the right way.

Hinata did not trust her body, that was for sure. They had been at this for an entire week. A week of getting stabbed by kunai had not done the trick, something that had somewhat surprised the snake Jounin. But this was getting ridiculous. She was going to have to take extreme measures to get the girl to just surrender and let her body, her instincts take over whenever the shit started to fly. Hinata would never be more than a mediocre shinobi is she couldn't manage to do that.

If the threat of physical pain didn't do the trick, there was always something else.

Anko sighed again. Being a teacher was hard work. She walked over to the sprawled and bleeding Hinata and picked her up around her waist effortlessly. If Hinata had been a little more with it she would have probably been really impressed at how her sensei picked her up and carried her like she weighed virtually nothing, and would have probably done something else than just hang there limply while the Jounin carrier her off. The woman walked over to the nearest tree and half set down, half threw (ok, more threw than set down) the genin against the tree into a sitting position.

Hinata grunted and contorted her face in pain at the rough treatment. Her head and her arm, and even the forgotten smaller cut on her shoulder all flared up. She was feeling weak, was still bleeding, and she couldn't help but feel miserable and a bit of self pity.

Anko knelt by her student, and gently took Hinata's injured arm in her hands. It hurt, but Hinata could tell that now her sensei was being deliberate and careful. Hinata after a week was still far, far away from figuring the woman out. She had never met someone who could be so rough and crass one second, and literally the second after her demeanor changed, and she turned in to a far more pleasant and considerate self. Anko did not _need_ to be treating her arm as gently as she was right now, and the woman knew it. Hinata wondered if it was all an elaborate act to keep people who knew her off balance, or if she really was this way for some reason. It was another one of the many mysteries that surrounded her new sensei.

After a few seconds of inspecting the wounds, Anko's hands began to faintly glow green, the tell tale sign of her healing jutsu (or jutsus, Hinata couldn't be certain). As it always did the wound had a bit of a burning sensation in it, and then it began to quickly heal. She knew that after a few seconds all that would be left of the damage would be some redness and sore muscles. It seemed miraculous really, and for a bit Hinata contemplated asking her sensei to teach her healing.

At some other time, she might have considered learning healing justu and becoming a medic (and a Fuinjutsu specialist, she had found she really enjoyed the subject). She liked the thought of helping people, and those two things (medic and Fuinjutsu) she would probably enjoy better than combat. But she knew that in the end that would not be good enough for what she wanted. She had to become strong, so she was doing what she felt she had to.

Besides, if she ever learned healing justu sensei would just make her heal herself. She was already exhausted enough with training to have to spend her own chakra to keep herself patched up.

As sensei finished her arm less than a minute later she was feeling much less out of it already. Anko moved to the smaller cut on her shoulder as Hinata flexed her healed arm experimentally, always amazed at how fast and efficient sensei's healings could be. Her arm felt really sore, like she had lifted way too many weights the day before. But the muscles and skin were completely healed. It was darn impressive. No wonder Tsunade of the Sannin was even more famous for being the world's best medic-nin than she was for her extremely impressive battle prowess. It was easy to appreciate how useful such abilities could be.

With three minutes, Anko finished healing all of Hinata's obvious wounds. "Here," said Anko as she produced a small blood red pill that looked a bit like a candy. She practically shoved it into Hinata's mouth. So much for being gentle.

Anko stood and walked away as Hinata chewed her blood pill. She really didn't like the things, though they were a necessary evil unfortunately. It tasted like chewing a dried blood candy, that was the best way she could describe it. She had almost gagged the first time she'd tried one. But it did take care of her blood loss in a hurry, though it always left her very thirsty afterwards.

Facing away from her a few feet back, Anko waited until the girl finished chewing her pill and turned her attention to her. When she felt the girl was done, Anko said, "Meet me in half an hour by the gorge close to the river. We're going to solve this problem of yours today one way or the other." And with that, wind and leaves began to swirl around her and the Special Jounin disappeared.

Hinata just sat there against the tree, resting to catch her breath for a few minutes as she thought about the whole first week of her training. A portion of it she had spent on the absolutely _miserable_ task of sealing kunai in that dammed scroll to the point of near chakra exhaustion. At night Hinata had been studying her Fuinjutsu scrolls that sensei had given her. She had spent the vast majority of the week dodging, or trying to dodge, hails of kunai from sensei. For the life of her she couldn't understand what her sensei was getting at. She just… she just didn't know. It was hard to let go. To act on instinct the whole time… part of that frankly scared her. Maybe that's why she couldn't do it. Maybe she was just scared to do it.

It was true what sensei told her all the time. She didn't have any confidence in her abilities. But her sensei seemed to think if she kept putting Hinata in dangerous situations it would eventually cause her to let go and just react like sensei wanted her to. But so far it had not worked, and she could tell sensei was starting to get frustrated. She (Hinata) was also starting to get frustrated at herself. She was trying. She _would_ get it eventually. The Hyuuga had faith because she had to.

But there was some sense of urgency in her, and in sensei too. She wasn't sure why that was, but it seemed almost natural for it to be there. She didn't want to wait. She wanted to get this done as soon as she could. After this part was over, she got what sensei wanted her to, she would_really_ be on her way to becoming stronger. So she would train hard and not complain.

She stood up carefully, feeling out her body to see if there was anything still majorly wrong. Aside from some soreness, and being a bit tired she was pretty much completely fine. Though she would have some bruises on her still-throbbing face if she didn't get sensei or someone else to do something about it. Sensei had not bothered with those, only with making sure there wasn't any serious damage. Still, she could worry about that later. With what she went through on a daily basis, some bruising was the last thing she would need to worry about.

With that, Hinata started her trek to the gorge. It was only fifteen minutes or so away. But she wanted some time to drink some water from the river. Those blood replacement pills always made her stomach feel queezy and made her want nothing other than to drink the whole river herself.

000

Anko watched from the shadows as Hinata arrived at the gorge, with five minutes to spare. The snake woman had tracked and followed Hinata hidden from the trees since the Hyuuga had arrived closer to the river nearby, in part out of boredom and in part to observe her student and learn what she could about her mental state. The girl seemed a bit frustrated, but still determined with some undercurrents of her self doubt pervading her whole range of emotions. Anko was somewhat surprised that this week had not dampened the girl's spirits. But she was not much closer to getting what Anko needed her to get, and the Snake Jounin had a rough timetable she wanted to keep.

Anko really, really wanted to have her student ready for the Chunin exams. It would be so freaking awesome if her student, as a rookie, could wipe the floor with just about everyone in the competition, and slug it out with the best that Konoha had to offer. Not to mention all the other allied nations. She could watch with pride as her student rose to the top and gloat to all the other Jounin about what incredible awesomeness her student was.

But there was something more than just that that made Anko feel a bit more pressed for time in their training. Something much more serious. When the Chunin exams came around, and especially the finals (because her student _would_ make it to that finals kamidamnit) their little secret would not be so secret anymore. People would realize who had been training Hinata. There was no way they would be able to keep it a secret then. It was hard to predict what the reaction of the Hyuuga clan would be, or hell even from the population in general. But she was sure it would be a pain in the ass, for all of them.

So, before then Anko needed Hinata to be ready. Ready enough for whatever shit might come her way. _Their _way. And also there was one final matter, and in Anko's mind almost as important. The girl needed to be strong enough to be ready to receive a little 'gift' Anko wanted to give her before the difficult finals. Something that would dramatically increase the girl's powers, almost overnight.

She just hoped that when Hiashi found out he wouldn't try to kill her. _Again,_she thought bitterly. But then again Anko was never one to shy away from what she wanted to do because there might be "consequences", or because she might piss off some stuck up pansies. The fuckers had failed before, and they would fail to get the Special Jounin again if it came to that.

It was time though. Now was now, and Hinata was going to learn this now or she was going to fall to her death.

"Hinata, come over here," said Anko in a flat tone from where she was in a tree maybe fifty yards from the gorge where Hinata had been standing. The young Hyuuga jumped a little in surprise, not having felt the Special Jounin watching her up in the trees. The Hyuuga girl nodded her acknowledgement to her sensei and walked over to where the woman had been watching.

Anko dropped down from the tree in front of Hinata when the girl had reached the tree. The Jounin regarded the Genin with a serious look, her purple eyes piercing right through the girl. Hinata tried to look her sensei in the eye as was proper, but under the intensity of the gaze she squirmed and eventually looked away.

The Special Jounin began with a serious tone, "In training Hinata, occasionally you have to put your life on the line to push you to the next step. It's not something that should be done lightly, but it is something that sometimes needs to happen to get someone over a particular hump, or to speed things along,"

Hinata squirmed nervously. She did not like the way this was headed. As if she hadn't been risking her life for a week already! Hinata had to fight the urge to grind her toes into the floor nervously or press her index fingers together. Her sensei had made it clear that any such nervous, self conscious fidgets would be met with the sharp end of a kunai.

"This is one of those times. Right here," said Anko, spreading her feet apart and pointing at the ground emphatically, "right now is when it goes down. Do you have any questions?" said the older woman with an aggressive tone.

Hinata shook her head. Even if her stomach was turning in knots, she got the gist of it. She knew by now nothing she said would change her sensei's mind when she was like this.

"Good," continued the Special Jounin, "then we will go over this one more time. This is what you are to do. Pretend you are dead." Hinata's look went from one of worry and nervousness to one of worry and confusion.

"That's right Hina-chan. You seem to have a hard time letting go, which tells me you think you have something to lose. Consciously or unconsciously you think you have something to lose by letting go, otherwise letting go would not be such a hard thing for you. So, tell yourself that you are already dead. Because the dead have nothing to lose. And if you can't, just remember that you will be dead in a few moments anyway."

Hinata, quite honestly, and much to her own surprise was starting to calm down a little bit, though for the most part she was still feeling worry and fright at what her teacher was telling her she was going to do. _Put my life on the line! _But honestly Hinata's nerves were just getting tired of being in tension all the time training around her sensei. It's not like she could stop what was going to happen anyway.

"So this is what we will do," continued Anko "I'm going to fight you, and I am going to beat you and push you towards that cliff," at the time she pointed at the gorge behind Hinata, "and I am going to attempt to make you fall off that cliff. Now, the side of that cliff is soaked with water. The sides are too slippery for you to hold, even with chakra. If you fall, you _will_ fall to the bottom and you _will_die,"

The girl for her part was going though her own strange range of emotions at hearing all this. There was fear for her life, and there was panic… but the panic she managed to bottle up somewhat. This last week had taught her how to control her panic so she could function, something she had never been able to do with her family. Maybe because that was a panic of disappointing them, not one of life and limb.

Still, dimly in the back of her mind, Hinata was surprised and proud of herself for not giving in to panic as her sensei stood in front of her and told her she would try to kill her. Things would not have gone this smoothly even a few weeks ago when she was younger.

"Tell yourself you are dead, and let go," the Jounin went on, "or I will make you dead. Let your body reactions take over, and get your mind out of the equation. Enough talking. We're starting. Now."

Before Hinata could get ready, she felt her head snap back as her sensei's fist connected with her nose. She was surprised and off balance by the sudden attack, her eyes tearing up and blinding her as she felt her sensei's foot connect with her stomach. The Hyuuga dubbed over with her arms over her stomach and stumbled back a couple of steps, but she managed to keep her footing. Bad mistake, this just earned her another fist to the face that knocked her flat on her back.

"Activate your bloodline. I _guarantee _you it wont give you an unfair advantage." Said Anko in a mocking tone, spitting on the ground very un-lady like as she stood waiting for her pupil to get up.

On her back, her face on fire and still getting her wind back, Hinata knew that she was going to have to fight for her life. Maybe literally. If nothing else, she would have to show her sensei that her faith in her was not misplaced… even if sometimes Hinata thought it was.

With that, something in her mind clicked. It may be irrational, or maybe not. But this was it. This was where she would get to see for herself if her sensei's faith in her was misplaced or not. If she did well, if she could pull this off, it would tell her one thing. That there was more to believing what her sensei said she could do than mere faith.

If she were to fail. Hinata thought it might be best if really she died today if she did.

After a few seconds of laying on the ground with these thoughts she made up her mind. Enough thinking, enough introspection. It was time to see if she could fight.

"Byakugan!" she almost screamed, bringing her hands together to form the appropriate seal. The Hyuuga moved and did a backwards roll from her laying down position, springing on her hands and coming to her feet. The girl quickly settled into her Juken stance, veins popping eerily on the side of head, a look of serious determination in her eyes.

_Good, _thought Anko, _that is the most fire I've seen in her eyes to date. As expected, given the situation. Time to see where we can take this._

Anko rushed the younger girl, moving much faster than the Hyuuga girl was used to. The Jounin swung with her fist in a wild arc aiming for the girl's temple. Hinata moved to block, but as she put up her guard she realized the Jounin missed on purpose, making the swing just an inch too short of her head.

The snake woman used the momentum of her punch to whirl herself around. Now Hinata saw one more purpose for the long flowing coat: as the Jounin swung around, the coat flared up and created a disorienting wall of beige in front of her face. It would not have been any problem for her eyes, but the bottom lip of the coat rose up and with its edge slashed across her eyes. For a moment the Hyuuga closed her eyes on reflex and it distracting her for a split second.

As the woman finished her spin, she flowed into a quick jump in the air and came down with an axe kick aimed at her student's head. Hinata saw it and turned her body to move out of the way. Her sensei's kick landed where the Hyuuga's head had been a second before, the Jounin's heel hitting the floor with enough force to send dirt flying in all directions. Hinata knew she was lucky, her eyes had been the only thing that had allowed her to see the attack from above after that disorienting move with the coat.

Hinata saw an opening, after landing her missed attack her instructor was left with her side wide open. The Hyuuga decided where to strike, and without hesitation moved in with a Juken strike to a tenketsu point on her sensei's ribs. To her surprise, the Jounin just casually stepped backwards until her torso was just out of reach of the younger girl's strike. In the same motion she brought her arm down from above, chopping the extended Hyuuga's arm – which had become her lead guard after missing the attack – out of the way, then moved in and punching Hinata in the face.

Hinata stumbled a step and a half back, and made a growling sound of irritation. Her sensei _had_ to hitting her over and over on the face on purpose. She just _knew _it. She was trying to get under her skin.

As if reading her thoughts, the Special Jounin smirked at the younger girl wickedly.

Anko came at Hinata again, attacking with a quick punch aimed at Hinata's face _again_. Hinata blocked the strike with her forearm, and turned her wrist so she could touch her sensei's arm with her fingers. It was a very subtle and small movement, and it was one of the main ways the Hyuuga could famously incapacitate an opponent's arms while trading blows without the opponent even realizing what was happening. Before they even knew it the tenketsu in their arms would all be blocked.

To Hinata's utter surprise Anko snaked her arm out of reach as she tried to touch it with her fingers. The Special Jounin snaked her arm under Hinata's and ended up with her arm inside the Hyuuga's guard. Hinata even caught another smirk on her sensei's face as she used the arm inside the block and pushed outwards, opening up Hinata's guard and proceeded to punch the younger girl in that face. Again. Hard.

The four hits the Jounin had landed on Hinata's visage were starting to take their toll. Her face hurt and felt tender, and as anyone who's been in a fight can tell you nothing starts to sap your stamina like getting hit hard. She was starting to slow down, and knew she wasn't doing very well.

Hinata was also surprised and worried about one other thing. No one outside the Hyuuga should know about that subtle attack on the arms with the fingertips, even most Jounin had a hard time noticing what happened even after the fact. Yet somehow her sensei seemed to know about Hyuuga attacks and what's more incredible, she seemed to have found a way to counter them. Well, at least one of them. Which begged the question.

How did her sensei know that much about the Juken?

Her sensei came at her again, and after an exchange of blows Hinata ended up getting kicked in the chest and being pushed back further. Hinata was now convinced. The girl had tried most of the standard, and even a few not as standard, of the subtle and extremely difficult to counter moves that made the Hyuuga clan and the Juken taijutsu style so respected and feared. Her sensei had seemed to be ready for all of it and had a counter for all Hinata's moves that would leave her in a prime position to attack. It also almost seemed like her fighting style was a natural counter to the Juken.

Hinata was more than a little confused, and somewhat worried as well. Everything about her family's fighting style was a zealously guarded secret, they made sure everyone outside their walls knew as little as possible about their style by not talking about it. It was one of the strictest clan rules, they could not talk about their style except in the most general terms. And it's not like anyone could spy on them with so many users of the Byakugan present in the compound. But her sensei_seemed_ to know about the Juken though. What gives?

Her brief musing caused her to lose focus for a split second, something she _knew_she could not afford to do, and it caused her another fist to the face. Hinata felt a sickening crunch inside her head, and through the sudden sharp pain in her nose she thought her nose was broken. The girl fell to one knee, panting.

As her sensei loomed over her, Hinata could feel the blood start to drip down her nose and into her mouth. It was really odd, being in pain with blood. She was used to being in pain in training with her family, but there never was any blood.

"Twenty five yards to the gorge, Hina-chan. Twenty five yards to your death. You bettter follow my advice if you don't want to take a swan dive to the rocks," said the snake woman cryptically. The woman blurred out of sight and kicked Hinata in the chest. The girl went flying back with a scream and landed on her back.

"Twenty yards Hina-chan. I suggest you start listening to me. I won't say anything more." Was all that Anko said, while she waited for her student to regain her feet, as the young girl slowly stood.

Hinata could see that her sensei was right, as she struggled to her feet. Twenty yards. They had started about fifty yards from the gorge. The girl had been so caught up with everything she had not noticed how far back she had been pushed back, or how fast.

As she tasted her blood on her lips as her nose continued to bleed, she looked up and saw her sensei's face.

For a second, Hinata's heart caught in her throat. The look on her sensei's face. Hinata finally knew. She had been told before, but part of her she realized didn't believe it. How could she? But looking at her sensei's face, it finally hit Hinata like a ton of bricks.

Her sensei really_was_ going to throw her off the cliff. Like, for real. To her death. On the rocks below.

Oh shit.

000

**A/N:** Hope you liked it.

As to Hinata being surprised by there being blood when training. It was meant to be while training in Taijutsu, if that confused anyone. I just didn't know how to make that explicit without ruining the flow.

Cheers.


	6. Corpses fight rather well

A/N: Hey all! There were some questions as to this story being currently reposted from ThreeJewels "white snake" which is the exact same story.

Well, ThreeJewels is me! So I guess I'm kind of stealing my own story and reposting it :)

The reson for this is that I had some problems with the email associated with my ThreeJewels account... I could no longer get in to it. So I had to make a new account. I'm reposting my story and I'm continuing to write it. If you want to read ahead a bit, look up "White Snake" by ThreeJewels.

By the way, thank you everyone for reviewing! I've never replied to all my reviewers before but I've heard some authors doing that and I think it's a good idea. From now on any new reviews I'll reply personally. Thanks for reading my story, tell your friends about it!

On with the show.

000

Twenty yards. And Anko kept on coming.

And Hinata kept losing ground. The young Hyuuga, who had been so proud of keeping her composure, was quickly falling into unrestrained panic. She tried to dash to the sides, to get around her sensei to get some distance between her and the cliff. But Anko would not let her. When she had tried to run, twice, sensei had increased her speed to a degree Hinata could not even being to follow. The woman delivered a vicious roundhouse kick each time that sent her even closer to the edge of the gorge.

Fifteen yards. Hinata's hands moved faster, her feet moved faster, as only panic and fright could cause one to, fighting desperately to find _some way_ to escape, to get away from this crazy woman. But her moves were also becoming sloppy and lacked accuracy, something that someone as talented as Anko very easily exploited. A fist connected with Hinata's cheek and sent her stumbling a few feet back, against all her will and panicked desire to _get away_. But as hard as she tried, she could not get past her sensei. She was helpless against the woman.

Another push kick to the stomach sent Hinata stumbling back even further. Ten yards. Oh kami. Oh kami. Oh kami. Hinata was becoming so terrified all sense was leaving her. She ran at her sensei blindly, not really thinking, just having to get away from the edge of the cliff, tears starting to stream down her eyes. She was met with a palm strike to the sternum, so hard that for a few moments she was completely unable to breathe. Her sensei took the opening and side kicked the girl, knocking her backwards and to the floor.

Hinata lay on the floor, looking up at her sensei, tears streaming down her eyes. "No…sensei, no please…" she begged in little more than a hoarse whisper, so bad was her panic she could no longer even speak properly.

Anko gave her a look with absolutely no pity. Out of the back of Hinata's mind a little voice wondered if this is the face her sensei's enemies had seen before they died. Though most genin didn't like to dwell on it, no shinobi above Chunin got there without a lot of blood on their hands.

Oddly enough, this little uninvited thought somehow pushed away enough of her raw panic to be able to do a bit of the thinking she needed to do if she was going to get out of this alive. Hinata looked again behind her with her Byakugan. Oh no. Five yards. Hinata registered the distance, but didn't dwell on it, or she was going to lose it and start panicking again.

Hinata go up to a crouch, her sensei watching just a few yards away, waiting for her to make the next move. The young Hyuuga knew that if she didn't act soon, her sensei would. She was so close to the edge that another attack would probably send her tumbling over the edge.

She didn't know what to do, and panic started to take over, but Hinata pushed it down (bearly) knowing if she wanted to get out of this alive she would have to use her head to somehow get out of this.

Hinata, for all her confidence problems actually had a sharp analytical mind. If she got over her emotional and confidence problems, she actually had a tactical mind that could rival Shino and her cousin Neji in combat. That mind told her that things were looking pretty grim for her.

Hinata didn't know any ninjutsu or genjutsu other than basic academy ones. With her sensei only a few feet away looking right at her there was just no way she could fool the woman with either bushin or substitute herself with kawarimi fast enough to get away (she wasn't really very good with either jutsu anyway). Her main strength was her close range taijutsu. With sensei however she felt like a kitten trying to fight a leopard. She wasn't going to be able to escape that way.

Hinata caught a blur of movement. She crossed her arms in front of her in an X fashion by instinct, and sensei's kick caught her arms and pushed her back, far. Much too far.

The Hyuuga was now at the very edge of the cliff, and she realized she was out of time. She was on one knee again, looking at her sensei, who stared back at her without a hint of emotion on her face. With her Byakugan Hinata actually looked down the edge of the gorge. The edge of the cliff face was covered in water and slick moss. If she was falling there was no way she could stick to the edge. The other side of the gorge was too far to jump to… and she didn't have any ninja wire she could use to get across. If she fell, there was no way sensei would be able to save her. Even if she wanted to.

All of Hinata's insides froze. The girl knew she was going to die. There was really no way for her to escape.

"_Pretend you are dead" _

Hinata slowly got to her feet. If nothing else, she was at least going to go out on her feet.

"…_you think you have something to lose" _

She was a dead woman. All of a sudden, all her family, her father, what she thought about herself, how she thought she was worthless, how she had to prove herself to her family… none of it mattered. She could not stop the woman in front of her, and Hinata knew she was going over the cliff.

"…_let go…"_

Though scared terrified, somehow, at that moment, she felt the weight of her life lifting off her shoulders. Like it had never been there in the first place. She would have wondered at it, but she didn't. She just knew it felt good. She liked that feeling.

After all, what did it really matter right now?

"…_you are already dead. And the dead have nothing to lose."_

None of it mattered. She knew she wasn't going to go out without a fight.

And then her body moved.

Quick as a viper, Hinata's hand moved to her thigh holster and she flung three shiruken at her sensei. Anko, surprised but smiling at the sudden aggressive move caught one of the shiruken but had to dodge to the side to avoid the other two.

Hinata, for the briefest of seconds was actually surprised by what had just happened. And then she was moving again.

Acting on instinct, she ran for the now open side opposite where her sensei had dodged. With her Byakugan, Hinata saw her sensei reach in her coat and grab two weapons.

"Want to start using toys, now do ya?" said Anko with a maniacal grin. The Special Jounin loosened both weapons at Hinata. The girl however knew they were coming, and in the space of a heart beat had reached in her weapon's pouch and flung two weapons of her own to intercept the coming attack. The four weapons intercepted with a loud _clank! _but Hinata kept running, never losing a beat.

Anko let a sly little grin spread across her face, _attagirl, about time._

The Jounin quickly used a shunshin justsu (Body Flicker) to appear in front of the girl, startling her. Anko was pleasantly surprised yet again when the girl dropped her body low, stepped into her aggressively and struck out with a palm strike for Anko's belly.

_She's actually attacking! Fuck yea!_ Thought Anko, now grinning like a madwoman. She was now sure the girl now had this in the can.

Anko spun out of the way of the strike and hit a nerve on Hinata's elbow, making the girl wince and numbing that whole arm. Then Anko threw another punch at her face, one of the fastest she had thrown today. Unlike every other time however, where Hinata had been too slow to react or had not reacted at all, this time the girl brought up her other arm in a hasty, but effective, block.

The Jounin was even more surprised how the girl instantly went from the block to touching her arm with her fingers. Anko pulled her arm back and did lighting quick kick to the inner knee of the girls front leg, hard enough to tear some ligaments and damage the knee. The girl collapsed in a scream of pain as Anko jumped back to inspect her own arm.

It looked like the girl had gotten at least one of the Tenketsu in her arm, if the reduced chakra flow and mild numbness was anything to go by. Granted Anko had been fighting at a snail's pace by her standards, and had been honestly pretty lazy and sloppy about the whole fight (and yes underestimating the girl, but she was going by the runt's past performance), but still she was pretty impressed.

The girl was really a lot more fluid and graceful than Anko had expected. Apparently training under the clan head since you were sperm did have some real benefits. Now that it seemed her most crippling mental handicap in fighting was gone, the girl could really show more of what she could really do.

And Anko was still grinning like an idiot. Like a sadistic, evil idiot but an idiot just the same. She had to stop herself from cackling as she thought that now, _finally_, they could move on to the good stuff. Anko had a few ideas about things that would work well with the Byakugan, and she liked to do things _flashy_. Oh, she was going to love this.

The Jounin looked down at the girl in front of her a few feet away, and she found the girl looking at her with a frightened but determined face as she struggled to get to her feet with her busted knee. Huh? Oh, Anko mused, Hinata must think I'm still going to try to throw her over the gorge. _Naw, I would never kill one of my precious students!_ Anko thought _…unless it was a training accident or something_. She shrugged, not sure if having pushed Hinata over that gorge would have counted as a training accident or not.

Anko put her hands on her hips and casually smiled at the girl, "well done Hinata. Figured it out did you? Took you long enough, stupid brat. Good job."

The girl looked up at her in confusion, and then relief washed over her face. Well, relief mixed in with pain, Anko knew a busted knee was a real bitch of a pain. "Sit down Hina-chan, let me heal that knee of yours. You're going to be useless otherwise. We're done with this kind of training for the day."

Again the girl looked very relieved, and sat back down on the ground, being very mindful of her knee. Anko noticed that Hinata had this faraway look in her eyes as she sat down and the fact that the experience was over was settling in. Yep, there would be a bit of shell shock. This was probably the first time the girl had come face to face with her own death.

The Special Jounin walked over to the girl and sat down next to her, in a position where she could get a hold of the girl's knee. As she began a quick diagnostic jutsu to see just what she had busted in the girl's leg, she looked at the Hinata's face and saw she was looking away, and at the ground. The way her eyes were and her demeanor were classic signs of someone who was trying to make heads or tails of something disturbing. Anko thought it best to make sure her student didn't miss the point of this whole ordeal, she didn't want to risk having to go through this again.

"Hina-chan," said the Jounin as her hands began to glow green, "right there at the end. When you got away from me, and our little brief exchange after. _That_ is what I've been trying to hammer through your skull by skewering you like dango for the past week. Do you remember that feeling?"

Hinata hesitated a second, and then nodded her head slightly. "Hai sensei" she said in a whisper, still looking off into space.

Anko didn't speak for a few seconds, concentrated on repairing a few ripped tendons and ligaments of the knee. When that was over, she asked, "You sure you'll be able to call upon that same mental state, that same feeling again? You need are going to need to be able to recreate that on command. If not we might have to come back here and do this again" Anko said in a teasing-but-oh-so-malevolent voice.

It had the desired effect, as she saw the girl shudder a little. But then she said, a little louder this time, "No, sensei, I don't think that will be a problem. I'll remember". The girl still looked away, that look on her face still there. Her mind was in shock and trying to organize what had happened into something that would make sense in her head.

Anko shrugged. She wasn't much of a counselor. She's leave the girl to sort things out for herself.

Still, Hina-chan would have to do it later. They were not done with training for the morning yet, thought Anko with a mischievous (and slightly sadistic) smirk coming on her face at the thought.

God, she got off on torturing this little genin! Maybe she would set her up to fuck up on something today so she could have an excuse to cut her up and drink her blood. Yes, she thought evilly. As much as it could be a pain sometimes, becoming a teacher had its perks.

000

After being healed, Hinata had been forced to gather all the kunai still strewn over the two fields they had used that morning (somehow the ones Anko had picked up had ended up strewn all over the forest floor). Then Anko proceeded to take out that kunai scroll that Hinata had really, _really _learned to hate/dread over the past week. She had then spent the next hour sealing kunai into that… _dammed_…scroll. The closest thing she could compare going to near chakra exhaustion and then keeping going with just enough rest not to collapse … would be someone being forced to do sprints constantly and only allowed enough rest so they would not collapse on the ground. Except this was much more pervasive, like the discomfort and pain sunk down into your bones.

It was torture. But like most things, she now was at least starting to tolerate the discomfort. Even if she still didn't like it. And Hinata had to admit the…difficult… training seemed to be paying off. She now could seal about thirty kunai into the scroll before she gave out and had to rest, as opposed to twenty just a _week_before. She smiled to herself slightly, it was real nice to be able to see concrete results from her hard work. Sensei had said that it was a combination of mostly her chakra capacity but also her control getting better. After an hour she could now seal about a hundred kunai into the scroll, as opposed to maybe sixty just a week before. To be honest, if she wasn't getting that kind of feedback, she wasn't sure if she would be able to stay motivated with her sensei's… ermm… tough love philosophy (coughcoughsadistictorturetra iningcough).

But in the evening she was going to have to seal all 220 back in to the scroll. She really didn't want to think about that right now.

And then there was today. It seemed almost like a dream now, almost like it had happened to someone else. She had never been so utterly panicked in her life, in such a blind unthinking animal panic, and falling into that state no matter the circumstances made her feel ashamed. But it didn't seem real that a few hours ago she was only maybe a foot or less from falling to her death. She was still convinced that sensei would have done it. Sensei would have killed her. Hinata knew she should be more freaked out or scared by that fact, but for some reason she really wasn't. She had decided to trust her sensei completely, even if it was a leap of faith so to speak… so she trusted her to put her life in danger. Hinata comforted herself by thinking sensei must have somehow known she was going to pull it off, and beyond that the young girl didn't want to give it much thought. Thinking too much about this could get her in trouble, she didn't need to start getting any more frightened (or get paranoid) of her sensei.

And then there was the fruit of all that labor. She only had one word to describe it. Wow.

She had always been told that she needed to be perfect, to be the best at everything. Hinata now realized the biggest thing she could not let go of was this worry about being perfect every time she moved, every time she threw a punch or tried to dodge a kunai. Ironically, she thought feeling slightly irritated, it had been that pressure to be perfect every single moment that had in large part worked to screw up her head to the point where she couldn't function properly.

It was complicated, because she felt like if she let go she would screw up and not be as perfect as she needed to be… now, however, she saw that was clearly what was holding her back. In some ways at least.

When she was on that cliff edge, all of a sudden she let go of that need to be the perfect Hyuuga, because at the moment of her death, at that very moment it did not matter. At that point, all her worries fell away and they no longer mattered. Her self image and confidence problems she knew she had, her family and everything that went with it, her mission to get their respect and get her family back, her unhappiness, whatever hardships and her self pity, all that seemed to no longer matter. She was going to die and it no longer mattered.

And then her training and instincts took over.

Kami, it had made her feel free.

Hinata now had some idea why so many shinobi seemed to love fighting. She had never understood its appeal, until now. It was like she could forget the world around her.

She wanted to try again.

The Hyuuga realized however that maybe her experience was somewhat unique, or that not everyone saw things like she did. Some people she knew liked fighting out of bloodlust and a desire to hurt and create violence. Others because they loved to test their skills, almost like a game. Others loved to beat others and thus 'prove' their superiority. Well, she figured it was like they said… you really have to love what you are doing to become the best. Hinata thought she might become addicted to feeling that heavy weight being lifted off her shoulders… she supposed that counted as loving fighting, didn't it? Though in her mind she knew addictions were never a good thing. But she could already feel the burdens of her life returning to her, and she couldn't help but wanting to feel it gone again, even if only for a little bit.

And then there was sensei. Though the woman had only complimented her once today ('good job' and 'well done') and that had been in a sentence with some insults directed her way ('stupid brat' 'about time'), Hinata could tell the rest of the morning that sensei was very, very happy with her. Hinata shook her head, puzzled as nothing else still by her sensei. The woman had not bothered to hide her feelings at all, something frowned upon by shinobi, making it clear to Hinata by her attitude and her body language how pleased the woman was, all the time acting playful like a child. This was made doubly awkward by the fact Hinata still knew she needed to watch her sensei even more carefully during that time… she wasn't about to be fooled that the happy attitude of the woman meant that she was safe. Hinata had made that mistake once a few days ago, and had ended up with the unpleasant experience of having most of the bones on her right hand broken. The young Hyuuga shuddered at the memory. She couldn't figure the woman out.

However, despite the constant potential for danger and violence, it had made Hinata happy like nothing else that the woman thought that _she_, the useless daughter, had done something right and it had put someone like sensei in such a good mood. Granted she knew it had taken longer than sensei had hoped… but by sensei's attitude she figured that woman had gotten over that quick. Well, at least she thought so.

Though it shamed her, Hinata secretly reveled in the small praise and in having someone so obviously pleased with her, and she knew she wanted more. She wanted sensei to be proud of her, she wanted to earn her praise and see her happy with her progress, she wanted sensei to look at her with a big smile and, and… well, she didn't know what exactly. And this was all very embarrassing to her, but less so than it had been a week ago. Now she was getting to know her sensei. There was nothing wrong with wanting praise from someone you knew, even if it was a hungry and desperate feeling that left you feeling a little scared, right? And then a sad thought entered her mind.

If only my father could feel that way about me…

She tried to push away such thoughts, but the damage was done. All of a sudden the weight of everything happening in her life seem to fall on her again, full force. It was almost shocking how quickly it came back, and how her mood almost instantly went from pretty light and happy-ish to an almost full blown depression.

Hinata walked like this for a while, hands in her pockets, looking down at the ground and thinking about her father. Her family. And when, if, how, she could get them all to feel like a family again… and trying not to think about how they constantly made her feel.

Why couldn't this be easier? They were supposed to love each other, weren't they? Didn't that count for something?

Did her father really love her?

Before she realized it, Hinata was walking into the small clearing in field 11 where she was supposed to meet her team. They were all there aleady, Kurenai-sensei, Shino, Kiba and Akamaru looking on as she approached the clearing. Hinata schooled her face as best as she could so that none of them hopefully would suspect anything about what she had just been thinking about. She… kind of liked her team. They were actually really nice, once you got past Kiba's loud brashness and got used to Shino's cool demeanor. And they were very strong, too. However, she did _not_ want to be explaining anything to them about all the things going on at home. She didn't really want anyone to know, for that matter. It was embarrassing enough that Kurenai-sensei, and presumably sensei, already knew as much as they did about her home life.

"Welcome Hinata" greeted Kurenai with a smile from where she was leaning against a tree, closest to her. Kiba dropped down from the tree branch he had been sitting on and started walking over to them. "Hey Hinata" he said casually as he picked up Akamaru and put him on his head. Shino also walked up to them, nodding to her slightly as was his way of saying "hello". Hinata smiled and nodded greeted them all in turn.

After they all greeted each other, normally there might be a bit of small talk, but today Kurenai cut to the chase. "All right Team 8, I got word from the Hokage's office and there will be no missions this morning. They might have one or two lined up for us after lunch, so we'll plan for that. So for today we are turning our schedule up on its head. We typically train in the afternoons with missions in the morning, but today we will just have to do our training in the morning and wait to see about later on."

"Well, that's all right I guess," commented Kiba, looking perhaps not too excited about training so early in the morning (Hinata might have rolled her eyes but she was much too nice for that). "So what kind of training are we going to be doing today?" he eyed Kurenai suspiciously, "not _more_ genjutsu training, are we Kurenai-sensei?" he asked, apprehension clear in his voice.

Kurenai couldn't help but let a small smile creep on her face at Kiba's comments. She had started them almost right off the bat on recognizing genjutsu, and she had kept at it until she was satisfied that all three of them could detect even a moderately powerful one and had learned how to break a genjutsu to her satisfaction. Kiba had struggled the worst, and in frustration on the third day had loudly declared that he _hated_ genjutsu in all its forms. But after a week, even he was passable now at detecting and breaking genjutsu, though not as good as the other two. It was true the boy would never become a genjutsu specialist, but learning how to navigate yourself around them would be invaluable as genjutsu permeated the shinobi world.

They deserved a break. In maybe a week she would try teaching them some non-combat basic genjutsu that even Kiba should be able to learn. But she did have to try and teach them other things, as much as she would have loved to try and teach them everything she knew on the subject…there were many other things that they needed to learn before considering teaching that much specialized knowledge.

Kurenai stroke her chin absently in thought. Besides genjutsu she had them learn how to communicate with each other in non-verbal ways…basically the standard set of hand signs and cues a team could give each other whenever it was impractical or dangerous to speak out loud. Learning a "secret language" of sorts between them also served to foster stronger ties as a team. Two days ago they had finally mastered all those, and the day before she had been satisfied about their genjutsu progress so far. So what should she teach them now?

"Well, field non-verbal is done and like I said yesterday I think you are all doing well in genjutsu for now. I have some ideas about what we should be training next. But I want to hear what you have to say. What do you all think we should work on today?" Kurenai asked. She was curious to see their self-assessment as a team, and see what they think their strengths were and what they needed to work on. The red eyed Jounin expected Shino to be the first to speak up, since he was the most observant and had proven himself to be the keenest tactical thinker so far.

"Sparring!" blurted out Hinata, more forceful than any of them were used to from the girl. She quickly covered her mouth with her hands and her eyes went wide in a startled and somewhat mortified fashion. She hadn't_meant_ to blurt that out, it has just really popped into her head when Kurenai-sensei had asked!

All three of the members of her team turned to her with a mixture of surprised and questioning looks on her faces. Hinata felt her cheeks start to burn. Oh Kami, why did she have to act so stupid? Kurenai-sensei had obviously wanted something more insightful and thought out than _that._ Why did she always have to make a fool of herself?

Kurenai for her part was surprised, as were the other two members of her team, and with good reason she thought. In the week they had been a team it had become clear that Hinata was the _last_ person you would think of would go out of her way to ask for a fight. Kurenai imagined that since the boy's had known the girl for years in the academy that view of the girl was many years in the making. But the Jounin was not _as _surprised as she might have otherwise been. She had been watching Hinata closely, trying to see what changes her training with Anko started to bring. Except for the fact that Hinata never apologized now, even though sometimes she had to stop herself mid-sentence in order not to do so, nothing much had changed in the girl that was concrete as far as she could tell. She had started carrying herself with a bit more confidence but that was about it. So Kurenai had been curiously waiting for something to shift.

That Hinata would _want_ to spend a morning sparring was not what Kurenai had had in mind. That indeed was a big shift. Kurenai examined the girl, now with red cheeks and looking away, seemingly embarrassed by all the attention. Well, thought Kurenai amusedly, it's not like she's turned into a vicious bloodthirsty killer or the like. But something must have changed, I wonder what it is?

Well, thought Kurenai, there is one way I might find out. Besides, sparring at least once or twice a week is certainly not uncalled for.

"Good suggestion Hinata, though a bit surprising coming from you," said Kurenai with a wink at the girl. This just caused Hinata to turn a darker shade of red. "Sparring is a good way to hone certain critical things that are hard to learn in training, such as battle instincts and how to read your opponents well. They are also a good way to test your training and skills."

Everyone was quiet for a moment, and Hinata seemed visibly somewhat relieved now that the scrutiny was off of her. Though her two teammates still managed to get a few more glances her way out of the corner of their eyes.

"So," asked cautiously Kiba, "what kind of sparring are we going to do?"

Kurenai thought about it for a moment. They could all go against her, she still had not had her students come at her all at once, and it was something she planned on doing eventually. They would need confidence in her and her skills in the field if they were going to work well with her, and she needed to show them at some point that she was strong enough to take all three of them easily. It was sort of tradition anyway, and she wanted for them at the very least to get a taste of her very much non-traditional fighting style.

But she didn't feel the time was right for that, so that was out for the moment. The Jounin briefly entertained having them spar one another and going all-out, but she quickly dismissed the idea. They might do that eventually, but she didn't trust them well enough yet not to injure themselves severely by accident… a stray Gatsuga from Kiba, or Shino accidentally overdoing it with his bugs and leading to injury from chakra depletion for example. She didn't think it likely, but she thought it still might be a possibility. Kurenai for her part only knew the most basic medical jutsus, nothing like what Anko knew and not even close to a true med-nin, so she didn't want to risk it if something were to go wrong. When she had enough confidence in their control of their abilities, then she would allow them to do so.

So that only left letting them spar each other with some sort of restriction. She thought she would make this interesting.

"Well, why don't we try this? No ninjutsu, that is the ground rule for our sparring. But other than that, I'll let you guys challenge each other. The new one coming into the fight gets to make the rules. It can be any rules you guys want, one hand tied behind your back, in a circle, blindfolded, whatever. This way I get to see if the person coming into the fight knows how to play to their strengths, and the one being challenged will get to see if they have any weaknesses that need to be worked on. Be smart, remember the goal is to win. This is also a test of your tactical and critical thinking skills. At the end of the morning whoever has the most wins gets lunch on me tomorrow. Hinata, since you asked you get to challenge first," she said with a smile in her direction that made her fidget a little. "Any questions anyone?" She asked.

All three students shook their head. _Good,_ thought Kurenai, _let's see how fast they figure out the purpose of this exercise._

"So," asked Kurenai, "which of the two boys are you going to challenge Hinata?"

The girl looked up at her, and then looked over at the two boys.

"Shino" said Hinata, her heart fluttering in anticipation as she did. To her surprise she wasn't really that nervous. Of that, just a little. But she found herself surprisingly eager to test herself, to see if she could do it again. She wanted that feeling again. Desperately.

The taller boy gave a slight nod in her direction, and the two of them started to move away from the other two.

"So," asked Kurenai, "what will the rules of this match be Hinata?"

000

**A/N**: sorry for the long wait. Life has gotten in the way big time. I considered putting this on hiatus, but getting reviews even months later (and hits too) prompted me to keep writing. You guys kept me going, so thanks. I'm busy, but I will try to make some time to write.

Love you guys (the readers). Take care of yourselves. With any luck, the next chapter will be faster than the last.

Don't forget to review!

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	7. FYI Flashy is my middle name

A/N: Here it is, another chapter :). I'll be posting one chapter per day until I run out my old chapters that are already written.. then I'll start posting the new material I've written for this story.

I thought it might be interesting to share that I have this story planned out in my head pretty much from beginning to end... and it's only about I'd say 10%-15%ish done in my ThreeJewels account, somewhere around there. So if/when I complete this story, it's going to be an absolute monster lengthwise. Hope that's something you guys enjoy :)

By the way I'm making it my mission to reply to every single review I get from now on. It's my way to show my appreciation to readers and to feel like I'm in touch with people who enjoy my story and like what I do. Feel free to put any questions or comments you have in a review and I'll reply before I post my next chapter.

So that's about all.. enjoy!

000

It took Hinata a week to realize it. She supposed she shouldn't have been surprised, but for some reason she was. It was something she hadn't planned for, did not think was all that possible, but she could no longer deny it was the truth of things.

Sensei was absolutely insane.

As in, Hinata thought she might need some help (not that she was stupid enough to even suggest that). The young Hyuuga had always assumed her sensei's eccentric, confusing and violent behavior were just a mask… she acted unstable and switched personalities on a dime out of habit to keep people around her off balance. That is what she had told herself. That she could manage.

But now Hinata was convinced. It wasn't all a show to help her keep an edge by keeping other people guessing. No, it was just that her sensei was, indeed, completely off her rocker.

As violent as the woman was, Hinata wasn't sure what to think of her own life expectancy. Especially with this latest bit of idea from Sensei.

Sensei was smiling at her broadly, looking happy as ever but with a twinkle in her eye that made Hinata more nervous that it had a right to. "So, what do you think Hina-chan?" Anko asked in a teasing tone.

_I think you're absolutely insane,_ thought the young girl. Not that she would ever, ever say something like that to Sensei. She didn't have a death wish.

"Sensei," began Hinata cautiously, having to consciously stop herself from fidgeting, "are you sure this is, um, a good idea?"

Anko looked at her curiously. Then the woman produced a seemingly normal kunai out of nowhere, and threw it hard. It imbedded itself deep in a tree trunk some fifty feet away.

The Jounin then put her hand to her chest, and made a one handed half-ram seal that Hinata had never seen before. "Kai!" said the snake Jounin, and Hinata felt her chakra spike ever so slightly.

The kunai in the tree exploded, shattering the trunk of the tree with such force that Hinata felt the force of the blast and some small bits of wood hit her even fifty feet away.

The tree groaned and after a few seconds it collapsed. The area around the explosion was covered in smoke and kicked up dirt that made it hard to see. But it was impossible to miss the tall tree collapsing and falling on its side.

Hinata just stared, not sure what to say.

"What about that is a _bad_ idea Hina-chan? You keep saying stupid shit like that and I'll break your ribs and not heal them for a week." Anko whirled on her, and Hinata found herself staring at a kunai pointed between her eyes not an inch away from her. Sensei had been a good ten feet away and Hinata had not even sensed any movement. She gulped nervously. How could she move so darn fast?!

"I picked this because of your special talents," Sensei said to her, her voice suddenly gone husky. She liked her lips in a way that suggested she was going to eat her. "Now tell me what they are and why I picked this in particular. Otherwise I'm going to carve 'dumb cunt' on your forehead and tie you down naked while I bleed you dry."

Hinata wasn't sure what "cunt" meant, but she was sure she didn't want it on her forehead. And she sure as hell didn't want to give her sensei an excuse to do as she promised. Hinata touched her neck subconsciously. She remembered the last time Sensei had wanted her blood, and shuddered.

The young Hyuuga went over it in her mind. Sensei had brought her out here and told Hinata some of what "she planned to do with her". In essence she had told Hinata that she was going to make her 'bread and butter' be exploding tags. Or exploding seals on weapons to be more precise.

Anko had done something Hinata had never seen before. Instead of having an exploding tag on a timer like what was customary, or even set up to be triggered like a trap, Sensei activated the explosion with a hand seal done with one hand. Hinata had never even heard of one handed seals before.

Even scarier to Hinata was that the kunai she used looked like regular kunai. There was no tag tied to the hilt like was often done, in fact there was nothing to tell it apart from a regular kunai. Hinata had to admit that was a great advantage, after all surprising the enemy was just another way of saying the Shinobi mantra of deception and misdirection.

But it was so_reckless_ and _dangerous._ Especially the explosions created by Sensei. The few tags each student had been given to learn how to use them in the academy had not been _anywhere_ near as powerful as the one Sensei had just used. It was also easy for the enemy to hide if they survived the attack with all the dust and smoke created by the explosion. That was one of the big disadvantages.

So why had sensei chosen it for _her_? Why did she want her to use this crazy fighting method? What skills did she have that made her pick this for her?

_Byakugan._

Hinata's eyes widened slightly as the pieces began to fall into place.

Of course. No one could hide from the Byakugan. If she knew where they were, she just needed to get a kunai somewhere close to them and she would be able to… blow them apart. The mental image of that made her stomach flip unpleasantly.

Even if that didn't work and the enemy survived, an exploding tag going off near you will damage your senses for a few seconds. The concussion from the blast and the noise would damage hearing and awareness, and dust and smoke would obscure vision. She was also fairly certain one wouldn't be able to smell very well at least for a few seconds. If all went well, even if the explosion did not do much damage just being in the vicinity would render them more vulnerable for a short time.

"Sensei, it's because of the Byakugan," said Hinata with more confidence in her voice than she thought she had in her. She kind of surprised herself even. "With my eyes I'm almost guaranteed to be able to get a kunai at least close to my opponent. Then even if they avoid the blast, being next to the explosion will leave them temporarily disoriented. Normally all the smoke would hinder the thrower of the tag as well and thus make it hard to take advantage of the short opening. However, with the Byakugan that would not be a problem." Hinata stopped, having finished and feeling somewhat pleased with herself.

Sensei, however, was still looking at her expectantly. Hinata started to get nervous again. Was there something she had missed? The girl had no doubt the woman would carry out her threat if she didn't appease her.

Suddenly frightened, Hinata started to stammer the other things that had come into her mind, "Also, I'm small and quick and good with weapons. I can store a lot of these potentially in a scroll so there is some flexibility as to how big explosions I can make. And… and, well…I'm not fast enough to take advantage of the opening created by a blast really, but maybe I will be since you said Sensei kunoichi need to be fast… and, you know, my strength is the Juken… so… umm…"she trailed off, looking at her Sensei like waiting for the pronouncement from the executioner. This woman scared her, by Kami she did.

Anko continued to stare at her for a few moments with cold eyes, Hinata looking at her face but not her eyes, starting to feel the cold tendrils of fear crawling up her spine. Then, abruptly, the Jounin put her kunai away and smiled a big smile at the girl, hand on her hips. "You got it mostly right Hina-chan. Good enough for now at any rate" said the woman. Hinata let out a sigh of relief, not bothering to hide it and amusing the hell out of her Jounin sensei.

"So, does that second scroll I gave you make sense now?" asked Anko.

"Hai" replied Hinata. On the first day of training Sensei had given her two scrolls to study. One had been on the fundamental theory of Fuinjutsu (the Justu of Seals). The second much smaller one had been a Chunnin-level scroll detailing how to make exploding tags. Hinata had just assumed it was to practice and improve her skill in Fuinjutsu. She didn't know it was going to be a big part of how Sensei taught her how to fight.

She was going to fight mainly with powerful explosive tags? Sensei was well and truly gone, she decided. Hinata cringed slightly as she thought what her family would think of such an undignified fighting style.

Still, Hinata was still firm in her decision to trust Sensei… the woman obviously knew what she was talking about when it came to fighting.

Fighting. It made her think of her training that morning with her team. Kami, that had been a crazy ride.

000

_- Flashback; morning of the same day –_

"So," asked Kurenai, "what will the rules of this match be Hinata?"

Hinata looked at Kurenai-sensei. She knew what she wanted. Sensei had asked them to be creative though… but still. This was supposed to be her strength, after all. So it technically _was_ skewing things in her favor.

"Taijutsu only" Hinata said. She wanted it. Wanted to fight. Not for violence…just, to remember. What it felt like. She wanted to just fight and leave all the problems behind.

She was eager, and it excited her.

"Face each other" said Kurenai. Hinata stepped away from the group and gave herself a good deal of room. Shino walked with her, settling himself just out of reach in front of her.

"Hinata, you made the rules," said Kurenai, "and the rules said only Taijutsu. No Byakugan, or you lose." There was some amusement to her voice…Hinata had been entirely too eager to think things through properly.

Hinata blushed slightly, and derided herself internally for her stupidity. "Hai, Kurenai-sensei" she said. It shouldn't matter too much anyway.

The Hyuuga eyes her teammate across from her, and tension began to mount. Shino lowered himself into the standard Taijutsu stance from the fighting they taught all shinobi at the academy. Hinata eyed her teammate, and something shifted inside of her. Her look became serious, the look on her face calm but intense. She settled into her Juken stance, and all three people present could tell that something had changed in the girl.

Internally, Shino decided he needed to take this seriously. Things could well go much differently than they had a week ago when they'd sparred.

"Begin!" said Kurenai.

Shino wasted no time, and attacked. He stepped forward, and launched a powerful punch toward Hinata's sternum. Hinata surrendered. She died. She gave herself over to her training.

And she came to life.

Hinata stepped to the side slightly and parried his arm with her outstretched hand. She put chakra into that lead hand, and in what was considered a crude move by the Hyuuga fed chakra into his muscles so they would contract and convulse painfully for a short time.

Shino's surprise at the pain in his arm distracted him for a split second, long enough for Hinata to pull his punching arm just enough to "encourage" him to keep going forward, making him stumble a step. With a step of her own Hinata got behind him, fluid as a dancer, and aimed a palm strike at Shino's exposed kidney.

At the last second before her blow landed Hinata was shocked in terror and pulled the chakra in her hand back, in the end hitting Shino with just enough chakra to give him some mild soreness later on. But acting purely on training and letting go… she had almost delivered a full power Juken strike to her teammate's kidney. Unless it was treated quickly, that was a killing strike. The kidney bled like nothing else, and internal bleeding could kill you before you even really realized how serious it was. She was shocked and horrified at what she had almost done.

She was going to have to be more careful. A _lot_ more careful.

For their part, the other three members of her cell were shocked in their own way as well. Hinata, shy little Hinata that all of them had known (the two boys for far longer) and who had always been so timid and reserved…and who had just a week before been soundly beaten by Shino and Kiba both… she had just taken out the much larger boy in an instant. The match was not over, but no one was fooled. Even without the Juken, being able to maneuver behind your enemy and strike from there almost always guaranteed victory. Not least because if a shinobi got behind you and got a clean strike, you would likely not survive the encounter.

In under two seconds, Hinata had essentially won.

"W-Wow…! Hinata, that was AWESOME!" cried Kiba from the sidelines, Akamaru barking in chorus with him.

Kurenai for her part was pleasantly surprised, but not as shocked as the other two boys seemed to be. The girl had the training, and Kurenai was convinced also had the potential. She just needed someone to bring it out of her. Leave it to Anko to make the girl improve this much in one week. It was simply amazing. Almost all her gross hesitation was gone.

So no, Anko was not making the girl improve in her fighting. Right now, she was just unleashing what was already there. She had been heir to the Hyuuga clan (though she still technically was). There is much buried underneath there, already planted (if somewhat heartlessly) by her family, just waiting to be unearthed and brought into the light.

Shino for his part was flexing his arm, the one Hinata had struck, the pain starting to leave his muscles and his control over them coming back after a few seconds. The larger boy had been one of the better ones in Taijutsu in the academy, but he had been bested in a second. Shino decided to test if it had been a fluke, or if something had happened to change his teammate almost literally overnight.

The young Aburame came at her, hard, putting everything he had into his attack.

Hintata whirled and danced around him once again. She hit his face and swept his feet out from under him, and managed another Juken strike to his body when he hit the ground.

So this is what they meant about Hyuuga having the best Taijutsu in the Land of Fire, Shino thought to himself as he looked up at the sky, flat on his back and feeling the pain of Hinata's deceptively light hits. His Taijutsu he had learned at the academy seemed so simple and formulaic compared to her spinning moves, unusual hand work coupled with her confusing and graceful footwork. And that was without her using the Byakugan.

From that moment on Shino decided not to rely on his Taijutsu for much of anything anymore, if he could help it.

Hinata, for her part, was also somewhat surprised… though not as much as everyone else. And she would be lying if she said she wasn't pleased, though she felt a little bad about manhandling the boy.

"Um, Shino. Are you all right?" she asked cautiously when she saw he wasn't getting up.

The boy got up to a sitting position a little slow. "Yea," said Shino, "I am fine. Don't worry about it. Its training. As to the match," he said, getting up, "I give up. I can't defeat you in Taijutsu." With that Shino straightened up, and, somewhat stiffly from a bit of pain, walked over to the rest of the group.

To Hinata, it was strangely anticlimactic… she had expected to be able to trade blows back and forth and be able to lose herself in a fight. It had ended so quickly. Was Shino sick? Or… did it really make that much of a difference, fighting like you're dead as Sensei said, that she had really improved this much?

She wondered what her father would think of that fight. Hinata sighed. She was sure he would deride her for ruling out her own blood limit with the rules, and with resorting to crude uses of the Juken such as pushing large amounts of chakra into an opponent's muscles. What little relief she had started to feel from all her worries was instantly flowing back into her with such thoughts.

"So, I guess I'm next?" said Kiba, with a mischievous smile on his face as he stepped forward towards Hinata.

Hinata looked at him, his smiling face, wondering what the boy was planning to do.

"Rules, Kiba?" asked Kurenai as she reclined against a tree.

The boy just smiled. "Blindfolded. No Byakugan. Akamaru runs and hides. Whoever finds him first wins."

"WHAT!?" blurted out Hinata. She wanted to fight, not, not… of course Kiba would win, he would smell Akamaru out in no time!

"Sensei…" she turned to Kurenai with a pleading look. Their Jounin Sensei just smiled. _Kiba acts like a fool, but when it counts he's smarter than people give him credit for. He figured out the purpose of this exercise on the first try_.

"Nothing I said makes that against the rules Hinata. Sparring can be any contest between people, technically, and tracking is a crucial shinobi skill. I'm afraid you're just going to have to do your best Hinata" said Kurenai with a smile. Even though she knew it was impossible, she could have sworn she heard Shino snickering just a little bit.

"But… But… "Hinata protested, but nothing to contradict what sensei said came to mind. It _was _within the rules the red eyed Jounin had set out, after all.

"No buts, just do it Hinata. Only from now on, no blindfolds, and no more targeting Hinata's Byakugan in particular. Any questions? Good. Now get going."

Needless to say Hinata lost, and Kiba found Akamaru hiding in the bushes a few hundred feet away before Hinata could even come up with a plan in how to go about it.

But at least she figured out what was hidden underneath the underneath. This was sensei's way of testing how clever they were, and how well they knew each other's strengths and weaknesses.

Shino was next, and he challenged Kiba to gather leaves from thirty different trees in the shortest time. Shino won that one easily, sending out his bugs to trees and having them bring back one leaf from all the different trees, already done by the time Kiba was on his tenth. After that Kurenai said no more using bugs for retrieval.

Next, Hinata still wanted to fight… but she thought she would do something more clever. She challenged Shino to weapons only on the trees, first blood wins. This got a lot… a lot… of raised eyebrows. But Hinata had gotten so used to being cut by kunai in the past week that it didn't seem weird to her to win by scoring one little cut on her teammate… it was childish, really.

They traded weapons back and forth, Shino being surprisingly good with them, but Hinata being better, and with the Byakugan to track movement it was no contest. Hinata dragged it out until Shino ran out of weapons, then she scored a thin cut with a shiruken on his cheek. By this time the grey eyed princess was starting to feel a lot better. After that, much to Hinata's disappointment, Kurenai said no Byakugan.

After that Kiba challenged her to see who could catch Akamaru first… which was pointless, since as Hinata tried to run after Akamaru, the little dog jumped right into Kiba's arms. Hinata was getting very annoyed at her teammate and his admittedly surprising cleverness. She wanted to fight, dammit! She wanted to practice this new 'technique' of hers some more, being almost killed (maybe) to acquire it did make someone rather passionate about the thing. After that, Kurenai said no Akamaru anymore, which made Kiba groan and moan in protest and made Hinata smile a little bit.

Shino then beat Kiba by finding a specific kind of bug in the forest faster than the other boy, which was an easy win for him and got Kurenai to declare no more bugs in the matches.

By this time however Hinata was starting to have a good time… and so was everyone else. So she decided to put off her fighting for another day. She challenged Shino to a water walking contest. Hinata was surprised the boy knew how to do it, but he was not nearly as good at control as she was, so he tired faster and she won that contest after he sunk after about fifteen minutes. Kiba lavished her with compliments about it and she promised to teach him how to do the water walking. After that Kurenai said Hinata was not allowed to do chakra control in any of her challenges.

After a while of being restricted, they each found that they could no longer play to their strengths and had to look for weaknesses in their opponents they could exploit. It was very educational.

Shino was surprisingly well rounded, being above average in all Shinobi disciplines, but his weakness was sometimes too much reliance on his "family", his bugs. This only showed up as hesitation sometimes when he would like to use his bugs on instinct but would remember he could not. He was calm and rational and Hinata found that he would not be someone she would want to mess with if he was serious. She might have a hand up in Taijutsu, no doubt… but Shino was _too_smart for his own good sometimes.

Kiba on the other hand was almost below average in all shinobi disciplines, be they weapons or ninjutsu. He was average at Taijutsu she would say. He insisted he was much stronger when he could use his clan techniques (Kurenai had banned all offensive ninjutsu as too dangerous for this time) and Akamaru. But he was devilishly clever when he had to be, even if he was kind of silly oftentimes. He was the only one that without fail managed to come up with some task that ensured his victory.

In the end, they all had a great deal of fun… even Shino. And in the end Kiba, surprisingly, was the one who ended up with the most wins. It was a great bonding experience, and they all got to know each other a lot better than they previously had. They were coming closer together as a team.

Kurenai saw this, and was pleased. All had gone according to her plan.

_-End Flashback -_

000

_Afternoon, back with Anko_

For the next few hours, Sensei walked her through creating an explosive tag. It was essentially the same as the scroll, except that Sensei changed it slightly so it would go off with the half ram real she was going to learn to do one handed as opposed as with a timer. She also learned why Sensei's tags were so much more powerful. The power was proportional to how much chakra you put into the tag. Sensei had put a LOT of chakra into the one she used to knock down that huge tree. It would take at least three regular ones to bring down a tree that size.

There was a problem though that at a certain point you got diminishing returns with how much chakra you put into a seal versus the power. So Sensei also showed her how to tweak the seals further so more chakra could be absorbed for more power. It was horribly complicated, and just barely she was able to grasp all of it and remember it. If she didn't like Fuinjutsu so much that she had read the fundamentals scroll almost every night, there was no way she could have kept up.

Then it dawned on her: Sensei was going to torture her by making probably hundreds of exploding tags. They took a great deal of chakra to make them even moderately powerful. She almost cried out in despair when she realized this, as she hated training to exhaustion of her chakra now more than almost anything else on earth.

Next Sensei showed her how to wrap the tag around the handle of a kunai, and then wrap cloth over the tag like you would a regular kunai to hide the tag. However, the wrapping of the paper around the hilt would interfere with the seal since it deformed it into a much different shape. Hinata didn't know that made a difference. So she had to learn yet another set of seals to put on the inside cloth that went around the hilt so the tags would work properly when they exploded.

How Hinata managed to remember all that Fuinjutsu long enough to write it down at home, she'll never know.

Next, it was one handed seals. Anko explained that one handed seals moved chakra though your body in specific ways that were sometimes harder to do with full seals. For example she explained, the effect they were after with only one half seal would need four regular seals to accomplish. It was just a shortcut to move chakra in specific ways.

The drawback however was that half seals were much less effective. A half seal jutsu would be anywhere from a third to a ten times less powerful than full seal jutsus, even though you used the same amount of chakra. Most people would rather just do an extra couple of full seals and get ten times more power for the same chakra. Still, sometimes half seals were useful, and it was not a commonly known art. It didn't take her long to learn the half ram seal.

After a few hours of work, Hinata was somewhat tired, but she had her first exploding kunai in her hand, made by her own hands (with close supervision from Anko, of course). She felt the weight, flipped it in the air a few times. The balance was till the same, the additional paper didn't really make a difference. It looked exactly like a regular kunai, except perhaps the hilt wrappings looked a tiny bit thicker than usual.

"Well, get to it runt." Said Anko, watching over her shoulder amusedly.

Hinata liked the feeling of it in her hand. Something about having something so dangerous in her hand kind of excited her. She wasn't really worried about blowing herself up… Sensei had made sure she knew exactly how _not_ to do that… but there was a thrill about having something that could kill you, or someone else, in the palm of your hand. Well, she guessed a regular kunai fit that criteria too, but it just didn't seem the same thing.

Before Sensei got impatient, Hinata selected a small tree and threw the kunai at it. It landed about an inch lower than she wanted it to. The girl frowned. She was going to have to practice with these kunai, apparently the extra mass of the exploding tag made more of a difference in throwing than she thought.

She put one hand to her chest, two fingers up and pressed against her heart. Hinata took a deep breath, and gathered her chakra like she had been taught. "Kai!" she said, and released a small bit of her chakra, thereby releasing the chakra in the kunai she was focused on.

The explosion was much less powerful than Sensei's had been, but Hinata was oddly satisfied when the small tree splintered and broke apart, toppling over violently. She was oddly sad that hours of labor had resulted in destroying a small tree, but still, she was pleased that her work had paid off. The power of those little things was intimidating. She was surprised when she found herself smiling.

"Aww, isn't that nice, Hina-chan likes her own handiwork," said Anko in a sing-song voice and with a sadistic grin, "now how about you make a half dozen more by yourself. For every mistake you make I'm going to break one of your bones, Hina-chan. Better you learn that way now than do something dumb and blow yourself up later. Do you understand?" the Jounin asked sweetly.

Hinata gulped, and she nodded. What else was she going to do? Sensei was crazy indeed.

000

Shino was finishing his first trip to the farm of Inuki Janos, the eccentric horse breeder. The new type of beetle he had discovered was proving to be very interesting. It was much too soon to think of any type of martial application at this point, but since that was the eventual aim it was hard not to think about it.

They did not seem like they would be good in the conventional Aburame way, since they were flightless. As this would the first ever beetle to be used this way, it would be breaking completely new ground.

Aburame insects were not naturally communal, but learned to be so by training. They had not found a communal species that could be adapted to combat yet. That is why this new species seemed so promising… the synchronization with a communal species has always been theorized to be many times better than what most Aburame can achieve.

He cleaned off some with a hose behind the barn, and picked up his bag. This part of the trip kind of irritated him. After spending hours before training with his team cleaning the stable for hours, and spending hours after training studying the new bugs, Shino just wanted to go home. But one of Janos's conditions was that he eat dinner with him with the food he brought. It was already getting dark and Shino was not in the mood.

But, he was a dutiful shinobi and an Aburame. So he would do as he must.

Shino found Janos sitting at a small wooden table in a simple kitchen in his small house, oil burning lamps already lit as it was quickly getting dark outside. There was no electricity this far from Konoha, but the burning lamps provided surpassingly good lighting in the small cozy house. Shino sat across from Janos with his food sack, the man watching him intently while he puffed on a pipe with foul smelling smoke.

"So," asked Janos in an old drawl, "what did you bring me?"

The Aburame genin reached into his sack wordlessly. He produced quite a few things taken from his clan's stores and some other things his mother had told him to go buy. There was a fine bottle of wine, ridiculously expensive by Shino's taste. There was cheese and breads from the most exclusive Deli in Konoha that served such things. There were fresh fruits and vegetables of every kinds, and some raw cuts of steak of the best kind he could find. He wasn't sure how Janos would feel about brining uncooked food to him, but Shino decided it was worth giving it a shot. It was expensive steak.

The man however, broke into a smile at seeing the steaks and all of the other things. "Very nice my boy, very nice. It's hard to get good food out here. Why don't you open that bottle of wine and pour me some while I cook us up these steaks, hummm?" with that Janos got up and limped over to the modest gas stove in his little kitchen with the food. He began to cut up the vegetables and the steaks, Shino watching very closely. Soon the tantalizing aroma of steak and vegetables was permeating the air.

Shino noticed the old man was very good with a knife. Maybe even shinobi good. Ex-samurai maybe? Mercenary? He really couldn't be sure.

He brought them plates and they sat in silence for a few minutes. And then Janos started to talk, and ask the boy all sorts of questions. Where had his clan originated from, how he liked being a shinobi, what his opinion was of Konoha. At first Shino was Shino, and answered in very short clipped responses. But as time drew on, he grew more and more comfortable and started to open up a little bit more to the eccentric man. There was something about the man that just drew him out and made him open up. Oh sure, he was still serious Shino, but he at least started talking more and more freely.

Janos, Shino realized, was a nice guy. Overly curious and boastful at times, but Shino formed the opinion that he kind of liked the man. Rare thing for those who knew Shino well at all.

"Can you guess what I did before I bred horses Shino?" asked the old withered man, eyeing the younger man quizzically.

Truth be told, Shino only had one guess after hearing the man talk for a while. However he was fairly certain he was right. "You were a Shinobi" he said.

Janos nodded, "Yep, you got that right. You've got good eyes on you boy."

"Shinobi from Konoha?" asked Shino cautiously.

Janos nodded, "Of course, boy" he said. Shino relaxed a little bit at that.

They ate in silence for a few minutes. Then Shino ventured to ask what had been on his mind, "so why do you hire shinobi to help around here and not stable hands? It would be a lot cheaper."

Janos did not answer, and after a few minutes stretched out Shino decided he wasn't going to get one. He was wrong however. The old man smiled a secret smile that cracked all his withered sun scorched features. "That," he said, "is _my_ secret. And one for another day."

Shino thought that response should bother him, but it didn't. They made light conversation for the rest of the meal, and bug shinobi stayed much later than he had originally intended to stay.

000

_The Next Morning_

Hinata showed up at the training field to meet her sensei, a few minutes before five in the morning, like she had been doing every day.

Sensei was not there yet, so she sat down under a large tree, took a deep breath, and began to take in the woods around her. It was rare when she had even a few moments to take in the trees and appreciate the natural beauty around her. It was peaceful. Quiet. She wished she could stay like this for the rest of her life.

Hinata looked around when she felt a presence, only to notice a snake slithering towards her. It was green and yellow, a grass snake like the one she had seen the first day she had met sensei… the overly friendly one. Except this one was about four feet long, when the one she had seen then was about three feet. Surely a snake couldn't grow a foot in a week, could it?

It came to a stop a few feet from her, Hinata examining it curiously. Just a grass snake like before, long and thin. It came closer, and before she knew it it was crawling up her arm, being overly friendly and… it seemed to her… wanting her attention.

The young Hyuuga giggled a little bit. This had to be the same one as before, right? How many wild snakes were this friendly? "There there cutie. I do like you, you're very nice you know that?" she cooed at the snake. It looked at her, and then lifted its head exposing the underside of its head. Hinata thought she knew what the little snake wanted. The girl reached over and started scratching the little thing under his chin. It curled its tail and rubbed itself against her hand in obvious pleasure, and Hinata couldn't help but giggle at the little thing.

She suddenly felt a presence and looked up. There she was, Sensei, looming over her. And Hinata had not even heard her come, had not felt any chakra, _anything_to indicate she was going to move. The woman was like a ghost. _Nobody_could move like that. How did she do it?

The woman smiled savagely at her apprentice. "Hina-chan, now that you can actually use what you learn to fight, it's time for me to tell you what sort of a shinobi I'm going to turn you into. You're going to find out what's going to define you for the rest of your life as a shinobi." She said a slightly excited and dangerous tone to her voice.

Hinata gulped. She wrapped the snake around her neck without thinking and spoke. Obviously she was expected to ask. "Wha-t sort of shinobi is that…sensei?" she asked.

Anko's smile widened even further, and for a second Hinata thought she looked like a snake. "An assassin, Hina-chan," she said, "you're going to become an assassin- little girl."

000

**A/N:** Well, sorry for the delays. Next chapter some more character development, training and so forth, and pretty soon they will be going on their first mission. Everyone needs a good initial mission, right? :D.

Anyway, thank you everyone who reviewed. It makes writing all the more fun. I'm still slow, I know, but without reviews I would be slower still. Thank-you guys (and girls).

Tell me what you think. Feedback encouraged an appreciated.

Everyone… Take care! …


	8. Clan of lies

**A/N:** Thank you everyone who reviewed the last Chapter! It made me very happy ;)

Someone mentioned a Naruto vs Hinata and how that may happen eventually… I have to tell you you are psychic! Such a conflict has totally been in the works fot the future… with a twist. Keep reading and look forward to it!

So, I realize I am a slow writer. Hopefully over the next few months that will change. It turns out I am not taking classes this summer (college) so I will have a lot of free time. Yay for fanfiction! I'll try not to make you guys wait so long for the next, I swear.

And at least, here we are.

Please

Review!

It makes the author's work so much more enjoyable and (I think) produces better work in the end.

Enjoy!

000

"An assassin?" asked Hinata, a slight tremble to her voice. For all the confidence she had gained in the past week – had it only been a week? – of training with her Sensei, all of a sudden she felt like a little girlagain… small and frightened, and not for the first time doubting if Sensei really knew what she was getting into when she picked her, _the useless daughter,_ as her apprentice.

Assassins, for as feared as they were also had the highest casualty rates amongst the higher echelon Shinobi… this much was common knowledge. And it took a particular kind of individual for a person to make that their specialty, and live to see more than a few years of service. It also took a kind of mind that could take a life of such hardship, for it was a hard one. Hinata wasn't sure, no in fact she was almost_positive_ she was not cut out for it.

Anko watched her pupil, and watched her well. The woman could see the emotions flickering through Hina-chan's face, surprise, self doubt, fear, shame, and a look she had come to recognize as fear of disappointing…either herself or Anko, or maybe that rat bastard of a father and the rest of the cock sucking clan.

The Special Jounin continued to smile at the girl and tease her, but inside her mind was working and turning gears. She was convinced she was right, Hinata_was_ best suited for this type of training. Perhaps she should explain things a little more… as much as she loved to be a bully, Anko unfortunately appreciated that a willing subject was worth much more than an unwilling one. The peasants on the Land of Earth were proof enough of that.

So she began. "Yea, an assassin runt. That's what I am, if you must know" Anko puffed herself up, and pointed to herself with obvious pride, "meet Konoha's number one assassin! No one in active duty today has had as many successful assassination missions. Or as many dangerous ones. It's practically all they give me anymore, since I am so damn good."

The woman sopped, and a dark shadow crossed over her face. "I'm the best at what I do Hina-chan. Others kill, and kill well… others are as strong as me, I'll even admit that… but what they don't have is my specialization, my skill set, and my talent for killing. You see, I was bred and trained as a stiletto that silences you in the night. Silences you forever. Others might be as good at fighting, or as strong as me, but no one in the village now is as good at killing. That is the difference."

Anko could see the confusion in the young girl's face, as well as the dawning awe as she realized her Sensei was Konoha's number one assassin… which is different from being the number one killer, mind you, or the number one sadist… but still. An intimidating thing for any young girl, she supposed.

"Um, Sensei…"began Hinata.

"Goddamn you, stop your 'Um's and 'Ah'ms all the time and speak plainly girl. I hate that self conscious shit!" Anko burst out at her. It wouldn't do to get through the morning without at least a few outbursts to keep the Genin on her toes, she mused. And it really did get on her nerves. "No apprentice of mine is going to talk like that" she said.

The girl cowed a little at the rebuke, but decided not to let it get to her as it had before. She didn't want to disappoint Sensei, Kami she didn't…but she was also learning not to take every little outburst to heart. To her credit, she began again in a more or less firm tone, "Sensei, what I meant to say… what do you mean… what's the difference between being good at fighting and good at killing…? I thought you fought to kill. It's not the same thing?" she asked .

The snake Jounin smiled. This was probably going to take a while, and this was going to be a conversation she was going to enjoy. She was rather proud of her craft after all.

Anko plopped down on the ground in front of Hinata who was still sitting up against a tree, still absently having the overly friendly garden snake around her neck, just kind of hanging there. The Jounin crossed her legs in front of her and began to speak:

"There _is_ a difference between being good at fighting and being good at killing. There should be one obvious difference by just the words that are used. What is it Hina-chan?" asked Anko, for once not hostile. In fact, she actually seemed kind of friendly and conversational. Though Hinata really knew better than to relax, for some reason it sort of put her at ease anyway. It was like Sensei was actually going to have a conversation with her instead of just telling her how things were going to be. She kind of liked that.

"Well…" began the young Hyuuga, "I guess the most obvious is that if you train for fighting, you train to beat your opponent. You goal is not necessarily to kill, it's just to win. If you train for killing, then you… well, you train to kill… which I guess means you also train to win. Since I guess by default you win when… if your opponent is dead. I guess it's just a different approach to it though, different approach to winning. Killing or fighting."

Anko nodded her head. She expected nothing less from her apprentice. "You got it right runt. But there are more differences than just winning and killing. Fighters train to win, and that means they will take any approach to it. Wearing their opponent down, beating them to a pulp, neutralizing their attacks. Fighters take a wide variety of approaches, and how they do it is incredibly flexible. They want to win, and they don't care how they do it, and many times they have that luxury to fight as they please. If they want to kill they can always do it after they win,"

"Killers, assassins, on the other hand are a little bit different. By our very nature we often have to eliminate targets in hostile territory. We may have to kill a single powerful shinobi surrounded by many others. Or a politician in a household full of samurai. So for us," and Hinata noticed the use of 'us' and wondered if it included her now, "how we 'win' is by killing. And because of the nature of things, we have to do it fast. Very fast. As in, every one of the moves we use must either be one that can kill or one that sets up an easy kill."

The Snake Jounin paused for a minute, letting that all sink in. Hinata for her part was having a little bit of a hard time digesting all of this.

She, Hinata, was going to be an assassin? Delving deep into enemy territory to kill the corrupt enemies of the Land of Fire and the village? She hadn't been on anything higher than a D-Ranked mission yet. She had not been even come close to ever killing anyone before. The thought of it made her stomach churn. Could she do it? Could she kill people… because it was her duty, because it was required of her? To please Sensei and the village?

And there was also another issue.

She was Hyuuga, and by Sensei's definition they were definitely fighters… what would they think if she turned into an assassin? Other shinobi that were assassins were at least grudgingly respected by the Hyuuga for the necessary services they provided for the village… but she was fairly certain it would be frowned upon if she did it. Hyuuga who became ANBU (an assassination squad among other things) were usually branch members and though respected within the clan they were also treated with an undercurrent of disdain. It was hard to do both respect and disdain at the same time, but somehow they did it in the Hyuuga. Almost like it was below the clan to do such furtive things. Which had never made any sense to her… since being furtive was supposed to be the lifeblood of being a shinobi.

Just another thing of her clan she wouldn't understand. If she ever asked her father, he would just deride her for her stupidity. And none of the other adults would humor her when she was in such bad graces with her father.

But if she became a strong shinobi, they would have to be pleased with her regardless right? Father would have to notice, wasn't that the case?

She believed it was the case. She had to. Hinata was staking all her hopes on that fact…that Hyuuga respect strength. And they would recognize her. Father would recognize her.

_Kami, let it be true._

She looked over at Sensei. To Hinata's surprise, there was an annoyed and angry scowl on her face. For some reason it didn't frighten her (as much) as she did not sense Sensei was directing that towards her specifically…but she was surprised because Sensei never looked this serious. Even when she was making threats… and even as she methodically went and hurt her, like she had broken a couple of her fingers when she had made mistakes the day before making explosive tags… she was never this serious. Scary, yes. Terrifying, absolutely. Serious? She had not been sure the woman was capable of it outside a fight until now.

Anko for her part just looked at her with anger and annoyance on her face. "You're thinking that that rat bastard clan of yours won't approve, and it's making you hesitate" she said. It was not a question. Anko had been trained to read people by the best, and getting inside her apprentice's head and figure out what she was thinking was now almost laughably easy.

The Jounin moved over to where she was, and before Hinata could register it she was jabbing a finger at her chest. "You. Don't. Get . A. Choice. You belong to _me_, you bitch, and if I want to turn you into a killer no one short of the Hokage himself is going to stop me." Anko was quickly losing her temper. It irked her, irked her to no end that Hina-chan was really doing all this to appease that poisonous family and uncaring asshole of a father. So she could rise to the impossible standards in their eyes and then… what? Fat chance it would ever get her what she wanted. As if Hiashi would even for an instant put her above their precious clan, let alone himself. As far as Anko was concerned, that family didn't deserve the girl. Let other people who will actually think about _her _wellbeing take care of her.

In some ways that was her business, and in some ways it wasn't. But the Special Jounin vowed that if nothing else, she would make Hinata strong enough to tell her family to fuck off when the time came. And it would come. She knew the Hyuuga's too well to think anything for Hinata would change.

But that was neither here nor there right now. So, right now Hinata had a problem that being an assassin might not be good enough for their "respectable" and "honorable" clan? Fine. She'd give her a little history lesson. Tell her about the glory and history of the Hyuuga clan.

"Listen, and listen well girl. I'm going to tell you the history of your_precious_ clan that is so ancient and noble and so goddamn respectable. They don't tell you where the Byakugan came from, do they?" the older woman asked with a cruel and knowing smile.

Hinata was still in kind of a shock at her sensei's outburst, and was somewhat nervous having her so close, kneeling right in front of her and jabbing her finger repeatedly at her chest as she made each point. But when what the woman had said registered, she realized the woman was right…well, partly right. The history of the clan had been lost a hundred years before the formation of the elemental nations and the founding of Konoha. Everyone knew the clan was ancient, but no one knew anymore what happened before that terrible time a century before the founding of the elemental nations. Did Sensei know something? About so far back as to the origins of the Byakugan, even? The founding of the clan?

If she did, how was it possible Sensei would know and she didn't?

Anko could read her face. The girl did not need to speak before she had her answer.

"Of course they didn't Hina-chan. Only a few of the elders and the head of the clan really know the truth. The fact is they _do _have the history of how the clan began, perfectly recorded and kept in secret. Do you want to know what it is?" asked Anko, her intensity and seriousness starting to melt back into her usual relaxed demeanor.

What could Hinata say? Without thinking too much about where the info could come from, if it was true why would the history would be hidden from the whole clan, and most of all why would _Sensei_, an outsider of all people know the history when it so obviously would be one of the most guarded secrets in Hyuuga… if they did in fact know the history as Sensei here claimed. Without thinking too much about that and resolving to ask the hard questions later, she simply nodded for Sensei to continue.

Anko smiled at her. For some reason, she was going to enjoy tarnishing the clan in her young apprentice's eyes. "It all began a long time ago, roughly 800 years ago now…"

000

Hyuuga Tanaka born an orphan, his mother, he was told, having died giving birth to him. He never had any idea who his father had been. He was told his mother's name had been Hyuuga, but it was not of much importance since she was of peasant stock and had no family. To Tanaka, it was the only tenuous link he had with a mother he never met.

He was raised in an orphanage, but rarely had enough to eat so had to go begging on the street, as did every other child. At the age of fourteen he ran away from the orphanage and all its abuses, and ran to join the armed forces of the most powerful Lord in the land he inhabited. The name of the land has long been lost.

As service ensured warm food and a place to sleep, many clamored for the honor to serve the Lord. The boy was turned away, but when he refused to leave one of the Lord's men struck him. Angered, and quite foolish at that age, the young Tanaka fought back. He was given the worse beating of his life.

The General of the Lord's forces, however, had been watching from a distance. He was intrigued by the boy's spirit and courage against larger armed men, so he decided to let him join as an apprentice foot soldier. Thus Hyuuga Tanaka was allowed into the Lord's service.

As the years passed, the General's choice proved to have been a wise one. Tanaka was a natural leader, and his talent at the martial arts was nothing short of astounding. At eighteen he became the leader of fifty men, who quickly gained a reputation for being the Lord's most fearsome platoon. At twenty four, he was second only to the old General in command of the Lord's forces. With him leading the charge, winning many battles, the Lord's land and power in the region increased exponentially.

At twenty eight, Tanaka realized he had been killing for half his life. Battle after battle after battle, he had taken more lives than he could count. The great genius of martial arts and natural leader had grown tired of war and killing. He asked the only boon he ever asked, and that was to be dismissed from service. The Lord reluctantly granted it, and offered great riches to Tanaka in reward for his years of service. Hyuuga Tanaka declined, feeling it was not right to profit so from the mountains dead he had helped create.

Hyuuga Tanaka shaved his head and became a monk at a temple of Amida. He sought to cleanse his soul from all the crimes in his life, to find a way to be at peace and to pay back the dews of all the lives he had taken.

It is said that many times bandits attacked the temple. In the past many would have been killed and much taken, but with Tanaka there he single handedly defeated every single one of them. What is more surprising, it is said he did without killing a single one. For ten long years he sought enlightment, and for ten long years he fought off savage bands of bandits without taking a single life. That if nothing else speaks volumes of what his skills were in the marital arts.

Amida, in seeing this was moved by the compassion and the respect for life that this man Hyuuga Tanaka held. He come to Tanaka in a dream and told him to go into the forest, where he would complete his training to find enlightment and the cessation of suffering.

For ten more years, Hyuuga Tanaka lived alone in the woods, receiving teachings in dreams and visions from the great and compassionate Amida himself. In the end, when the training was complete, Amida saw that Tanaka had indeed become a Holy being, and was pleased. He saw in Tanaka a man who could instinctively see the truth of things. This was why he was so successful in the martial arts, strategy, meditation, and in anything else he put his mind to.

So the great Amida, in his infinite compassion, gifted Hyuuga Tanaka with pure white eyes that would further enhance Tanaka's abilities to see the truth of things. When one can see the truth of things, one's spirit can open and the ending of suffering can take place, a true being of light can emerge. This was Amida's gift to Hyuuga Tanaka, with the purpose that he would use it to further spiritual teachings and to help reduce the suffering in the world.

Tanaka left the forest, and established a family. All his decedents were born with the same gift from Amida himself, and Tanaka was pleased. He lived for another forty years, all that time teaching his children and his children's children how to use the gifts of Amida to see the truth of things, to help them reach spiritual truth and thus flourish peace and foster compassion in their hearts.

The Hyuuga clan came to be known as servants of Amida, revered and sought out far and wide, for they were all Holy men and women, and it was said just being in their presence could relive the weight in a man's heart.

Tanaka also developed a martial art that everyone was required to learn, for he had learned while at the temple that not even Holy men were safe from the violence of some wicked men. He developed a martial art using the gift from Amida where victory would almost always be guaranteed in combat, but left the opponent completely unharmed after they had some time to rest. The great compassion of Amida and of the Hyuuga clan was such that they could not even bear to do serious damage to one who would take their lives. So Hyuuga Tanaka and all his children had to be good enough to defend themselves and leave their opponents unharmed… so soon the Hyuuga became famous as the best unarmed fighters in all the land.

Thus the Hyuuga were servants of Amida for almost six hundred years, teaching their children the ways of enlightment and compassion, serving others and seeing the truth of things with their holy Byakugan. And always, in the tumultuous world learning how to defend themselves, but always while leaving their opponents unharmed.

Then, wars began. The age of chaos that lasted for almost two centuries before the foundation of the elemental nations began.

The Hyuuga were attacked by surprise in overwhelming numbers, by a powerful Warlord who saw them as a threat to his power. Seeing as they were completely overwhelmed, the elders stayed behind to hold off the attackers while the younger of the Hyuuga escaped. Perhaps half of all Hyuuga survived that fearful night.

The survivors were young, traumatized by having to flee their ancestral homeland and profoundly bitter. The teachings of Amida were also incomplete in them. All the elders who knew the complete teachings were lost, killed during the attack.

They were also angry. Amida was not so deep seeded in their hearts that they could feel only compassion for their enemies. This was the beginning of the fall of Hyuuga as a clan of wise Holy men and a people of love and compassion, and the beginning of the Hyuuga as a family and clan entrenched in petty politics and struggles for power. But that would not happen just yet. At this time, the Hyuuga that were left were hunted down by the Warlord.

So one Hyuuga Shinni, while the Hyuuga were engaged in a skirmish, struck a man in the heart and killed him instantly.

Pain and sorrow and fear overcame the survivors, fighting for their lives. And as one, as if by some unspoken command only they could hear, they began to kill the ones who came after them.

It hurt them deeply, like they had betrayed their very souls. But they could not stop. They did not stop until the Warlord and every one of his men were dead. The Hyuuga wiped out perhaps fifty times their numbers in the space of a few months, without one additional death among them.

But the unrest was not over, and the Hyuuga, now led by the first killer among them since Tanaka, Hyuuga Shinni ensured the survival of their clan. In the power, the service to various lords, the backstabbing and the battles, the teachings of Amida that were left slowly faded… after a century, their past was nothing but a memory even as the clan continued to increase in power and influence.

Still, amongst many in the Hyuuga the memory of what had been still haunted them, and many clamored to find the old ways again, the Hyuuga as they had been for more than six hundred years before this time of death and struggle. The crisis of identity became so bad within the clan that many feared it would fragment. There were ones who wanted to find the teachings of Amida once again, and there were those who thought survival and power and pride were what should define the Hyuuga.

The end result for was the leaders of the fraction against the ways of Amida to consult a renown seal master… and develop a seal that could be used on rebellious members to control dissent. Those who preached peace and compassion, love and the ways of Amida were given what came to be known as the "caged bird seal" so they could be controlled. Any mention of Amida or the past of the clan became punishable by death, which would be carried out by use of the new seal almost half the clansmen now bore. Those peaceful ways were seductive to many, and the leaders felt it had to be stamped out ruthlessly lest the future of the clan be in peril.

Within a decade, there was no one left who would speak of the old ways.

The next generation began to be told that their clan was proud and ancient, but nothing else. Before long it became assumed no one knew the true history.

However, even the most callous leader was not without pride in the man who had been Hyuuga Tanaka, even though they now stood against everything Tanaka had stood for. So a secret history was written, as the history of the clan was deemed too precious to truly be lost forever. Only those who could be trusted not be foolish enough to try re-establish the clan of Hyuuga Tanaka, for truly it was foolish… would be trusted with reading the secret history, and with the pride and honor of their_true_ heritage, which could not be revealed lest fools chose to seek and try to cripple the Hyuuga with idealistic nonsense. Only those who were worthy could be told.

Those who had been branded with the caged bird seal became the underclass of the Hyuuga. It was decreed that their children should also bear the mark… and that those who bore the mark live to serve the unmarked. They then became known as the 'Main' and 'Branch' families, both in order to hide the origin of the seal and to institutionalize who was truly in charge of the Hyuuga clan.

Nearly a century after this, after surviving and even thriving in a world of constant war and political upheaval, the Hyuuga allied themselves to a new coalition of powerful warrior clans. The Hyuuga became the first powerful ally to join the newly formed nation forged by the union of the two most powerful clans in all the land, the Senju and the Uchiha. Unlike the Senju and Uchiha the Hyuuga had been closer to samurai than shinobi, and now the Hyuuga were asked to be as shinobi. The leaders ultimately agreed was acceptable for the position their agreement with the Senju and Uchiha gave them. The Hyuuga, always powerful warriors, now became shinobi.

And the Juken became the complete opposite to what its creator, Hyuuga Tanaka, had intended. Instead of being a way to defeat your enemy without harming them, it became a way of capturing your enemy alive. Many times, this meant death for the captured enemy. And except under exceptional circumstances, it always meant torture and suffering for the captured. The Hyuuga and Juken became prized for their ability to capture enemy alive and interrogate them. Their eyes, given to them by holy Amida himself, were now used to find men and kill them mercilessly, or else capture them for torture. The Hyuuga became one of the deadliest weapons for Konohagakure.

How Hyuuga Tanaka must mourn silently from the grave.

000

Hinata paled considerably as she heard the story her teacher told. Her first instinct was to deny it. It was such an ugly & tragic history at the end that she didn't want to believe it was _her_ history, the history of her clan, her people.

Her Sensei looked serious and kind of smug at the same time as she knelt in front of her. "So you see Hinata, when the elders come to you and tell you that the things you do are very unbecoming of a Hyuuga… those are the same hypocrites that know how they and their ancestors bastardized the clan more than two centuries ago. They have no right to be telling you what _should_ or _should not be_ the proper way for the proud Hyuuga to behave and act… in the end they betrayed everything the clan had stood for for more than 600 years. And when they had a chance to revert back to the ways of Tanaka, they stamped it out ruthlessly. Not the ones in power now themselves, but ones just like them at the time the caged bird was first placed on the branch family. The Hyuuga clan lives a lie, a lie that denies their heritage. What right do _they_ have to tell _you_what a proper Hyuuga should do?"

Hinata's mind was whirling at all this information. Some parts of it at least made sense, or seemed to fit. The Hyuuga had been a clan of warriors and not shinobi before joining Konoha, that much was more or less common knowledge amongst the Hyuuga. Even now most Hyuuga shunned the use of most ninjustsu in favor of specializing in the Juken. The family also behaved much more like a samurai family than any other family she was aware of in the village.

And then there was the Juken… it _was_ designed to be a nonlethal martial art, by closing all the major Tenketsu of the body the opponent would be incapacitated. However after a few days rest left alone they would recover and there would be no damage. Why was it designed that way, if they were warriors constantly fighting for survival before integrating with Konoha? They had no use for prisoners for the most part before joining a ninja village. Was it really that this man Hyuuga Tanaka had designed it to be nonlethal, because of their religious and spiritual beliefs? Because of their devotion to Amida?

Hinata knew there would be no going back to the old ways. At least not in her lifetime. There was no trace of this ancient devotion to Amida left in their clan today if the story was true. _If _the story was true.

The girl looked at her sensei, and eyed her with more than a small bit of suspicion. How could she know all that if it was true? If no one but a few Hyuuga knew of this 'secret history' how could she, a complete outsider, possibly know the story?

There was also the fact that Sensei knew the Juken inside and out. When they fought, Hinata had been sure… the woman had extensive knowledge of the Juken and seems to have worked out extremely efficient ways of how to counter it. It was like she had _**intimate**_ knowledge of the art. No one was allowed to watch training and there were no texts at all with any detail speaking of the Juken. So how had Sensei learned it so intimately?

Then she remembered Kurenai-sensei warning her to make sure no one in her family knew Anko was training her. That made her nervous now, and she looked at the situation in a new light. Was this all related somehow?

So being bold, and having to know if what Sensei said was the truth of things, the girl asked cautiously, "Sensei… how do you know all these things?" she asked.

Her Sensei sat back on her heels, and gave Hinata a long look. It looked to the young girl like the woman was thinking something over in her mind. At last, she said simply, "I snuck into the secret Hyuuga archives and read about it, once upon a time."

000

Sensei had given her the afternoon off, saying she had something she needed to take care of. It was her first bit of time off in eight days of the most grueling training in her life, and Hinata realized she was exhausted and bone weary in more ways than one. She just wanted to get into bed and get to sleep. But Hinata was fairly sure she would not be able to fall asleep right away. Her mind was still whirling from the things she had heard that morning.

Kurenai and Kiba and Shino had noticed something was wrong with her in their team training and in the single D-Rank they did that day. She almost screwed up catching Tora the cat when he ran right past her. Hinata caught him in the end, but not without a handful of painful bloody scratches all over her arms and one nasty one on her chest as a reward for her being distracted.

Now she was walking along the hallways of the Hyuuga mansion, all of a sudden feeling alien in her own home. All of a sudden it almost felt like the walls might open and someone would come through and accuse her of knowing things she should not know… or maybe accuse her of believing lies about their clan from a stranger.

So had Sensei even been telling the truth…? Hinata tried to wrap her mind around what had happened as she took a walk through the large Hyuuga estate, tired but needing to sort things out in her head. Sensei had not answered any further questions about how she 'snuck in' to a place even she herself didn't know where it was. The clan obviously had secret places where important things would be kept, but one such as her (Hinata) did not have the privilege of knowing where those places were. Probably hidden somewhere in the estate or close by. So how had Sensei learned about it?

And most of all, how could she have snuck into someplace guarded by Hyuuga? That was the part that boggled her mind the most. No one could hide from an experienced Hyuuga, from the Byakugan. She was positive the elders would have at least one or two people discreetly guarding the secrets at all times. Nevermind that if the hidden places were in the grounds of the estate, there were always at least two guards with their Byakugan's activated to guard against intruders coming into the compound.

Hinata doubted anyone could sneak into the compound and pull off something like that without being detected.

And yet…

They had drilled into them in the academy that no defense was perfect, every security system and perimeter could be breached. Nothing was entirely safe or certain and no system flawless. So it **was** _possible_ that something like that could have happened. The way Sensei said it she could almost see the woman waltzing in and sitting down for a few hours of quite reading. The image was preposterous in her head, but she had to grudgingly admit that is was possible.

But was it likely? Hinata didn't think so. Still, if anyone could do it it might be the woman who was now Konoha's number one assassin…

It kind of sent a chill through her to realize that the Hyuuga would have been perfectly within their rights to kill Sensei had she been caught breaking in to a secret clan place. Clan secrets were their most valued possession, and technically anyone caught sneaking in a clan's property without permission could legally be killed. Of course if it was a kids game to be sneaking into the grounds no one would take it that far, but a shinobi breaking into a secret room of a clan… she had no doubt most clans would capture and imprison for life or execute on sight. She also knew without a doubt which route her clan would have taken if they had discovered Sensei, she thought with some discomfort.

At any rate, Hinata wasn't sure why but she felt pretty confident that Sensei was not the type to lie unless she had a good reason… at least not in any way that really mattered, like making up this elaborate story about the Hyuuga to… do what?

Oh yes. To make her feel less bad about not doing exactly what her father and the rest of the clan expected her to do as the "proper" Hyuuga thing to do.

If anything, though, the story Sensei told her made the thought to being an assassin even_less_ appealing. If the clan as a whole had strayed from what Hyuuga Tanaka had wanted, wouldn't she go further away from those ideals if she became an assassin shinobi on top of everything else?

But for that matter, should she really care at all what Hyuuga Tanaka did and wanted for the clan? Her father and the elders who knew about it obviously did not. Should she? She did think it sounded like a very nice way to live, the Hyuuga clan of Hyuuga Tanaka… that was a clan she would not mind being a part of at all. But today they were too deeply involved with Konoha, and their lives revolved around the village and being shinobi… it would not be something feasible at all, or something she would want, to abandon the village to go live the lifestyle of Holy men and monks. Even if it was a nice idea.

Then came the most disturbing part of the whole story… the origins of the caged bird seal. Hinata had always been appalled by the practice. Mainly because she saw how much hurt and suffering it cost her cousin Neji to have to bear one. It was like enslaving half the family. That it had originally been used to suppress the descent of family members who wanted to return to their peaceful roots almost made her want to go throw up in the nearest bathroom. It appalled her, utterly and completely. It was the reason she couldn't bring herself to resent her cousin even with all the abuse he heaped upon her. Hinata could not imagine she herself, or her children, having to live and die with the caged bird seal. She always told herself she would do something about it when she became clan head… something that right now looked like it would never happen she thought with some gloom.

How did this make her feel about her family? And should she hold the elders… and her father… responsible for it? As if somehow they are also guilty because they are keeping such a big secret…? Not that it mattered much what she thought, she thought with a bit of dark humor. It's not like she had any power to do anything about it.

One thing was for sure though. It made her a bit sad to realize it, but the esteem in which she held her family had gone down a notch or two. Not that that meant she loved them any less.

Hinata rounded a corner in one of the hallways of the main house absorbed in her own thoughts, and ran straight into an elderly servant. "I'm sorry!" she squeaked automatically. Then she realized what she said and put her hands to her mouth. She had managed to go a week without apologizing as Sensei had asked her… and now she had messed it up.

The young Hyuuga heir was terrified. Sensei would know. Kami, she didn't know how, but somehow, somehow Sensei would know. She didn't know how she knew, but she _knew_ the older woman would know. Oh by Kami, no!

It was because she was back in the household! She spent half her time when she was here apologizing for her mistakes. It was so ingrained in her she couldn't even filter her brain before the apology came gushing out.

The old servant looked at her completely oblivious to her inner turmoil and discreetly nodded his acceptance of the apology, as if to say "no harm done". Then he spoke to her, "Hinata-sama, your father asked me to find you. I am to inform you that you are to attend a formal dinner tonight. We are expecting guests. He also requested that you come to his study an hour before supper. The dinner is scheduled for 9:00 in the evening."

Hinata went deathly pale. "Thank you for informing me… Hibin-kun" she said, remembering his name at the last moment. He bowed politely to her with a smile and went on his way.

And Hinata almost wanted to fall to her knees and cry. It was currently about four in the afternoon. She had hoped to grab something quick from the kitchen and be in bed by six, so she could sleep and recover for a good ten hours until she had training again tomorrow at five in the morning.

Instead she now had to attend a formal dinner… always a tiring affair for her. And it would go on for at least two and a half hours, probably closer to three. She wouldn't be in bed until well after midnight, but she still was going to have to get up at four in the morning to make it to training on time. Hinata just wanted to sleep.

And she always hated these dinners. They were so formal, everyone being so cold and proper. Not that her father was ever warm to her… but it was even more maddening and depressing in a large formal dinner for some reason. And she would have to stand the slightly disinterested disdaining looks from all the elders, including her father at some point or another. Neji looking at her hatefully in his own proper and cold way. Hanabi, her little sister who was way too young to be as cold as she was… like she tried her best to emulate father.

Yes. She hated formal dinners. But she had no choice.

Hinata hurried back to her room, and thought to ask a passing servant who the guests were.

"Hinata-sama, Ichiro Haniko, the Uchiha Steward, and his wife, Uchiha Tiyin," the servant replied. She thanked him and dismissed him.

Hinata knew Ichiro Haniko had been made the head of the Uchiha in stewardship, even though he was not an Uchiha himself. It was seen as necessary, she had heard, because the only people left in the Uchiha after the massacre were a handful of non shinobi women and young children. She didn't know anything else about the situation, other than Ichiro had now apparently married an Uchiha.

Hinata ran to her room. It was four in the afternoon and she wouldn't have to come before her father until eight. Idly she wondered what her father would want to speak to her about. It was probably not going to be pleasant, no matter the case. But she had more important things to worry about right this second, even if it did give her butterflies to her stomach to think about their meeting.

If she hurried she could be ready in time to meet her father if she started at about seven. So, she was going to take the three hours from now until then and sleep.

A shinobi always had to make best use of her resources, after all.

She fell asleep seconds after her head hit the pillow, and dreamt of trees and lakes and snakes.

000


	9. Fire and the Heir

Hinata woke fifteen minutes late, and had to rush through getting showered and dressed at a frantic pace.

She put on a formal white Kimono with a pale blue sash and the same color trim. It was simple but majestic, and it was meant to be. As the heir to the clan, all her formal wear was custom made to make her look elegant and striking. It was done at outrageous expense, from the finest tailors in the Land of Fire, and though Hinata thought it was too much her father had insisted. How she looked reflected on the clan, he would tell her. Hinata had to admit, the way the dress brought out her eyes and pale features was indeed the work of a master. It could even make someone as plain as her look… beautiful.

Or at least the girl in the mirror looked that way. Hinata couldn't help but feel like she had somehow stolen someone else's form when she looked so grand in all the incredibly expensive formal attire she owned. She wasn't really comfortable with it. It didn't match at all with how she saw herself.

Hinata arrived at her father's study five minutes late. It had taken forever to do her hair and makeup. She sighed. Things would go worse for her now. She supposed things would have gone faster if she had allowed some of the maids to help her with her dress and make up. However, for some reason Hinata had always preferred getting herself dressed, ever since she was a little girl. Some of the time she had even been allowed to do so.

The young girl took a deep breath, and announced politely thought the thin paper walls, "Father, I have come."

"Come" came a crisp formal reply from within the door. Hinata took another deep breath to steady herself and let herself inside.

Her father was seated formally in front of his desk lit by two candles, not even looking up from what he was writing as she came in. Though they had electricity as most modern households in Konoha did, her father preferred to work by candlelight at night. It was the way their ancestors had done it, he had told her once. With a mix of resentment and a surprising amount of sorrow she wondered if he realized just how hypocritical that sounded. Her father and all the elders didn't seem too bothered by what all their ancestors who followed the way of Hyuuga Tanaka had done things.

Just like that she realized she had already accepted the story Sensei had told her about their clan. For better or for worse, she guessed she believed it now. The realization made her feel somewhat more bone-weary, and even more uncomfortable being in her father's presence.

She knelt down in of her father's desk (it was a traditional desk so there were no chairs, and one sat back on their heels on the ground) and looked at him expectantly, nervously. These things had never gone well as far as she could remember.

Her father continued to write, completely ignoring her for long minutes. She was now old enough to know that he was probably doing it because she had been late, as a way to show her how inconsiderate she had been. It was designed to make her uncomfortable, and even though she knew that, by Kami it still made her want to nervously fidget like a little girl. This was her _father_ sitting in front of her.

At length, eventually he spoke in that conversational but hard tone he often used. "Hinata, you are late. I don't want to hear excuses, but you will not do so in the future. You are still a member of the main family. Try to act like it. I will not accept such disrespect from you without severe consequence in the future."

Then silence again. Her father continued his writing. It took her a second to realize what he was expecting from her.

Hinata thought for a minute, and licked her lips. "Yes father. You are right father, I was… disrespectful. I promise it will not happen again in the future." There. It was polite and respectful, and she managed to do it without apologizing. She silently prayed to Kami her father would be placated.

Her father however seemed to accept what she said as he made no further comment as he sat there and continued to write. Hinata knew it was her duty to wait silently until her father was ready to speak to her. For the first time in her life, and in a way to her complete surprise, Hinata felt a small bit of resentment at just having to sit there meekly waiting until her father was ready to speak. But still, she kept her peace. The young girl was not nearly strong enough to go up against her father.

Finally, Hiashi spoke; "Hinata, I've called you here for a very simple reason. As of today you are being removed as heir to the Hyuuga clan. Your sister will be the new heir. The reason I am telling you this now is because I do not wish to see any shameful displays of emotion when the subject is brought up at the dinner tonight. The paperwork has been finalized, so it is already official"

Hiashi stopped writing, and actually looked up and looked his daughter in the eye with those quiet but intense judgmental pale eyes she had always feared. "While you may be removed as clan heir, you are still a member of the main branch. You will _not_ bring shame to our clan through any unsightly displays or actions. You are to behave normally, and have the attitude that you are happy with this decision, since you believe it is the best thing for the clan and for Konoha. We must present a unified front, or it might bring shame and questioning of our clan. You will behave in front of others exactly as I have just told you. Is that _clear_?"

Hinata was struck numb. She didn't think or feel anything at that moment. Automatically, robotically she said "yes father" as she had always done and always been expected to do.

"Good," said Hiashi, already returning to his writing. "Dismissed."

The young Hyuuga got up, still struck numb, and walked out of her father's study. She walked back to her room, still dumbstruck. It wasn't until she was in her room and closed the door behind her that it all started pouring out. She threw herself on her bed and started sobbing. Hinata cried, cried harder than she could remember crying, except maybe at the time her mother died.

She felt more rejected than ever now. More unwanted. More useless. More unloved. Hinata had known this was coming but… she didn't think it would be anywhere this fast. She thought she would have time to prove herself. But… she was useless… worthless… it was like her own family didn't even want her. No, even her own family didn't want her, it was a fact. She held her sheets and wept, wishing not for the first time that her mother was still there to hold her. Hinata only remembered tiny bits of her mother… but still, how she missed her still. It was all so hard, so hard without her mother… without_anyone_ to be on her side. Hinata just laid on her bed and cried.

It wasn't too long before she remembered to look at the time. It was 8:50. The dinner would start in ten minutes. Sadly, dutifully, Hinata pushed down her emotions and forced herself to stop crying. She was going to need every minute to clean herself up and fix her makeup so it would be acceptable at dinner. The girl knew she could not let anyone know she had been crying, or else her father's wrath would fall upon her. She bottled up her feelings, and went to clean herself up.

000

Hinata got a good look at the guests as they entered the large formal dining room almost ten minutes late. First in was the woman, Uchiha Tiyin. Hinata instantly felt somewhat sorry for her. She had the look of a woman who had the world to shoulder and it was slowly crushing her. Someone with a broken spirit.

Her husband Ichiro Haniko on the other hand gave off the air of a pompous, arrogant man. He was very tall and blonde, and for all the world looked to Hinata like he should belong to the Yamanaka clan. The man was loud, and though he kept to the letter of proper protocol as they went through pleasantries and sat for dinner it was almost like he laughed at and scorned the spirit of it while technically adhering to it with just enough amount of respect. It seemed to Hinata after a few minutes that he was the opposite of the Hyuuga clan leader (her father) in almost every single way, except for an attitude that said the world should bend to their will.

Hinata sat in silence. At least now that she was no longer heir, she doubted she would become the center of attention or conversation like she often had been in the past. Thankfully the succession of the Hyuuga clan was not something the guests seemed to be particularly interested in. She wasn't sure if she could handle the scrutiny and maintain a straight face. Thankfully for some reason she noticed, Neji seemed to be missing from today's dinner. She wasn't sure she could have handled his disdainful gaze falling on her tonight.

"Hiashi-san," the man Ichiro began after they had finally been sat for dinner "the great Uchiha and the Hyuuga have never seen eye to eye on many things. You could even say there had been a rivalry between our clans, though a generally it has always been a bloodless one. However, our clans have in recent history have always joined together politically as ranking members of the Council. I'm here in part to ensure that our clans' interests still coincide and there is no…disruption in our cooperation" said Ichiro in a slightly sing-song and somewhat arrogant tone of voice.

Hinata could see her father's face tighten almost imperceptibly. They had just sat down to eat, and the man Ichiro had already started breaking with their tradition. Normally there would be a period of small talk with pleasantries about each other's families, their health and so on. Then there would be some light political discussions and maybe the issues, if any, that were to be discussed later on would be broached on lightly. Then after dinner, the leaders and important guests would retire and serious discussions of whatever was at hand could begin. But this man Ichiro was just jumping straight to serious business almost right at the beginning of everything. Though there was nothing technically wrong with that, the breach in tradition and Ichiro's attitude Hinata could see were making her father very displeased.

"Why don't we relegate any weighty discussions until later, Ichiro-san? I'm sure Danzo will not get his report any later if we progress through this dinner in a proper and pleasant manner" said Hiashi, in a calculated cool and cold tone that was so characteristic of the Hyuuga.

Hinata frowned (internally, otherwise she might draw attention to herself). She knew from hearing conversations over the years that Danzo was a council member, and a very secretive one at that. Was Ichiro a subordinate to him then?

Ichiro scowled, then sat back and crossed his arms. Again in that annoying sing-song and mocking voice he said, "You imply that I am somehow Danzo-san's dog, Hiashi-san? I am afraid, then, that you have been misinformed. I am merely an ally, just like the Hyuuga have been allied with Danzo-sama for the last… what, eight years now? I was chosen as the Uchiha steward by Danzo-sama for my skills and our shared vision for the future of Konoha. You would do well to keep in mind my position. Our clans are friends, after all."

"Ichiro-san," began Hiashi, "as I remember, you do not have a clan. You do not come from a noble family, am I correct? A lone ninja. A pity. I believe in a few years you will be replaced in your post as head of the Uchiha by the youngest son of the late Fugaku… Suke or Sasuke was his name if I recall. Perhaps you should bring him along on these meetings, since your time at the Uchiha seems to be rather limited. It might be in the best interests of the clan once you are gone, don't you think so Ichiro?"

Ichiro picked up his cup of sake, and took a drink with a smirk on his face. "Young Sasuke will not be leader for some time now. My lovely Tiyin and I have decided it would be best to wait until Sasuke is a Jounin, and has married and produced an heir. We must ensure that the leader of the clan is able to produce Heirs, for the wellbeing of the clan as a whole you understand. And it would be a shame and unduly cruel to deprive a young man of his Kami-given freedom by saddling him with the responsibility of ruling a whole clan at so tender an age. So there is no need for you to be so concerned about my welfare, Hiashi-san. You will be dealing with me… and my wife too, of course… for a good many years to come. Don't you worry about that."

Ichiro then paused, then spread his arms wide and began again in a less confrontational tone, "But Hiashi-sama, we seem to be getting off on the wrong foot here. I came here on behalf of Danzo-sama and the rest of the members of our coalition to first of all congratulate the Hyuuga clan on your new heir, may your second daughter bring strength and power to the Hyuuga clan and the Land of Fire."

"Noted. You may thank Danzo for his concern" said Hiashi dryly.

Ichiro continued as if the nothing had been said, "also I am charged by the rest of our coalition to come speak to you about… a certain lack of discipline on occasion by some of our voting members. For our shared vision of a new and more powerful Konoha, our voting must remain disciplined and in line. I have come to enlist your aid on that matter since your word carries a great deal of weight with some people… we must not forget our ultimate goal."

Hinata, who usually spaces out when the verbal and political sparring inevitably occurs, was suddenly jolted back to reality. _"Our shared vision for a new and more powerful Konoha"? "Our ultimate goal"?_ This conversation wasn't making very much sense to her at all. Whose shared vision? What ultimate goal? Hinata got the impression she was listening in on things she wasn't supposed to be. Her suspicions became confirmed when she saw some of the elders look a bit uncomfortable after all that was said, and then again when her father spoke:

"Ichiro-san, all these issues will be addressed. I would appreciate it if we reserved such matters when we have some time to speak in private. I'm sure you can appreciate the reason for this."

Ichiro didn't miss a beat. "Of course, Hiashi-san. Let us have a pleasant dinner and reserve business until later then, shall we?"

After that dinner went on with the typical small talk that seemed to be standard for all these formal dinners. Much to Hinata's surprise and great pleasure, no one paid her the least bit of attention all dinner long. It was like she was part of a wall hanging, and today after the day she had had it was actually a rather welcome thing, not to have to be scrutinized and go through another emotional rollercoaster over all the things that had happened today. What did bother her was what she had heard… something about Ichiro and the way he had talked about their "ultimate goal" and a "new and more powerful Konoha" they… whoever "they" were… envisioned sent shivers down her spine. She didn't know what it was, but for some unexplainable reason, she was pretty sure this "new" Konoha Ichiro aspired to would not be one she would particularly enjoy.

Ichiro, Tiyin, her father and a few of the elders retired to a back room after dinner ended. Hinata had no idea what was talked about behind those walls, and she wasn't sure she even wanted to know.

000

Hinata had arrived at the training ground where she was to meet her Sensei a few minutes early, and had promptly fallen asleep sitting up against a tree. In the end she had slept a grand total of about three hours the night before. Only fear of retribution had gotten her out of bed at four in the morning after going to bed only a few hours earlier. However, little seemed to keep her awake once she made it to the training grounds on time.

When Anko arrived, the snake Jounin just sat on a tree branch almost directly overhead the sleeping girl and just looked at her for a few minutes. The girl looked so innocent in sleep, it almost made Anko want to gag… and if she was honest with herself, it also made her a little sorry for having to turn such a girl into a creature like she herself was. Anko knew she was cynical and tainted, cruel and ruthless but that is what it took to survive in a world of men and violence. The girl probably would have been better off being a Med Nin or a housewife or something like that. But the girl had her reasons of wanting to be strong, and she had the right to make whatever choices she wanted. Even if those choices led the girl down a path she did not truly understand.

But sooner or later, she would understand.

Now, as to her punishment… the little cunt face had apparently apologized some time the day before.

Anko did enjoy blood and seeing gore, but this morning she was feeling frisky but not particularly bloody for a change, so she thought of something that she had learned from Ibiki. The thought that she would not get to see a lot of it first hand kind of bummed her, but the thought of fucking with someone's head was even more appealing to Anko than just hurting them physically.

The Snake Jounin jumped down from her high perch and landed soundlessly next to Hinata, the young girl not even stirring. Grinning from ear to ear, Anko produced a small vial from somewhere in her long trench coat. She opened it and with great care and precision put a single drop of the clear liquid on Hinata's lips. The girl ingested it without ever realizing it.

Now, time to pick up where they left off.

"Hina-_chaaaan…_"Anko whispered sweetly in the Hyuuga's ear.

Hinata's eyes opened instantly, the sound of Sensei's voice having come to mean fear and pain of death since their training began. The girl was mortified to see her sensei's face right next to hers, smiling sweetly.

"… s-s…Sensei… sor… eck! I mean, I must have… erm. Good morning Sensei" she said at last sheepishly.

"Good morning, Hina-chaaan!" said Anko with a sweet smile still on her face, "So, what's it going to be?"

It took Hinata a second to process and realize what Sensei was talking about. Yesterday seemed like it had been a week ago. But through her grogginess she recalled what it was that Sensei wanted…

_Tomorrow, decide if you want to become and assassin or not. I'll still do what I want either way, but this shit can't be ambiguous. It's much easier to train you if you are either fully committed or fighting it tooth and nail. WIshi-washy half-ass shit never got anything done and has only got people killed. So decide what you want and stick to it, I don't give a god damn either way. _

That's what Sensei told her yesterday before they parted ways. Though, with the revelation about her Clan, and her being removed as Heir, the lack of sleep and all the rest, she had completely forgotten about this question.

Oddly enough, what came to mind first was not all the usual questions about if it will win approval of her Clan and if it was something she would be able to handle, emotionally or morally… no, what came first to mind was something she had heard the night before.

…_For our shared vision of a new and more powerful Konoha … we must not forget our ultimate goal..._

If anything were to happen, she would be helpless as she was. But she didn't want to be helpless… that snippet of conversation the night before made her think of conflict and revolution, even though there was no proof that it meant anything of the sort. Things _would_ change if some people had their way, she realized… and she knew, just _knew_that whatever Ichiro and her father and Danzo and whoever else planned would not be something she would be happy with in the least. Hinata wanted to be able to at least be of help if such a thing happened. Even if she wouldn't be strong enough to matter in the least until years down the road, that little conversation over dinner scared her enough. And she wanted to be able to do something about it should a big upheaval or _something_ happen.

So even if her family did not accept her for it… which she still fiercely hoped for, for all the pain they brought her… there were also other reasons for her to become strong.

And… what choice did she have? It's better to go along with what Sensei wants, Hinata thought. Strength is strength. And who would teach her if she were to refuse? Sensei was her best opportunity… maybe even her only opportunity. Hinata took all the reasons she had for not wanting to become an assassin and pushed them out of the way, hard. She had to be strong. This is what a Shinobi was supposed to do.

"Sensei," she began, "please… please teach me to be an assassin" she said, and bowed her head low in a respectful fashion like old traditional clans such as hers were still wont to do.

She felt her Sensei stand up. Hinata looked up after a second, and caught her Sensei staring off into space, and odd look Hinata could not quite decipher on the woman's face. Hinata's breath caught in her throat a little, as she realized this was probably the first time she was seeing Sensei without one of her masks firmly in place. It was a look she had not seen before and it was clear to see Anko was letting her guard down. The girl was not a fool though… she knew Sensei was allowing this rare glimpse by design, not by accident. The woman was too cautious for it to be otherwise. Hinata suddenly felt closer to her Sensei, like she had passed some kind of test put before her or entered some kind of exclusive club… she had earned some trust and been allowed just a little closer to her Sensei. It was a big deal, and Hinata was glad she was at least clever enough to be able to recognize it as such.

That's what it felt like… like she had somehow just entered her Sensei's inner circle by being allowed to see just a casual glimpse of the woman with no masks on. The girl knew that the people Sensei allowed even a little close could probably be counted on hand with fingers left over. It welled up a lot of emotions in her, and again she wondered how she could feel so much for a woman who she hardly knew and who brought her pain and misery on a daily basis. But at that moment she would not have traded that feeling of acceptance for the world…even as she knew it wasn't a complete trust. She had a feeling she would have to do a lot more to earn more of her Sensei's trust from here forward.

And the woman's face… though she couldn't quite place what was there it almost looked… almost a bit sad. It was the last thing she had expected to see from Sensei.

Then as fast as that open expression had been revealed, the mask snapped back in place as Sensei turned to look at her.

"Well runt, it's going to take some time to make you into anything worth the space you constantly occupy. So… let's get started." Anko moved her hand across her body and threw something at the girl. On reflex Hinata put up her hands and caught it.

She felt something squirming in her hands… and looked down and saw a green snake in her hands. The same garden snake that had come up to her twice before.

"His name is Nigiri. Make friends with him. If you're nice to him he'll come see you from time to time. Trust me, you'll be glad you did one day."

Hinata was a little confused. Anko rolled her eyes and explained before the girl had a chance to ask.

"I can summon snakes, baka. So it's good for you to make friends with them."

Hinata looked up at her Sensei, who was giving her a dirty "don't ask any more questions" look.

"Come on, follow me runt. I want to move locations before we get started."

000

Somewhere in a Hidden Canyon in the Sands of Suna, another more sinister snake met with the Kazekage and his advisors.

"So all is finalized then, Kazekage-dono? I trust that there were no problems?" spoke the slithery leader of the new Sound.

"Yes Orochimaru, all the preparations are completed. All is as it should be. We'll be able to use Gaara with little problem, if all goes to plan. However…" began the Kazekage, sounding a little worried, "are you sure you will be able to hold up your side of the bargain, Orochimaru? Are you sure you can take down the Professor? If you fail things could become quite troublesome, quite dangerous for my village… and your men."

Orochimaru smiled at the man. He was seriously contemplating killing him right then and there. In fact, he had told his subordinates to expect it, though in reality he had not yet made up his mind. He half wondered if the man's spine was made up of rubber. Why, one would think the man might lose his nerve at a critical juncture. Yes, there were plenty of reasons to kill him, now that the plan was in place.

"Don't worry, Kazekage-dono," began the snake sannin, "Sarutobi was my sensei, and I can tell you without any doubts I have surpassed him. He is now an old man, a mere shell of his former glory. Sarutobi will fall to me, don't worry yourself in the slightest. Our surprise strike will crush Konoha, Kazekage-dono. And then the power of Suna and Oto will rise to new heights. Have faith Kazekage, our plan is sound."

The Kazekage hesitated for a moment, and then nodded. "Yes, the plan is indeed a good one. I suppose all we have to do is wait for the exams then. We must keep an eye out for any divergences from the course we have set out, however. I am adamant about this. I will not allow my village to take any unnecessary risks in this operation. Now, were there any other issues to address Orochimaru?"

The snake sannin was tempted, oh so sorely tempted to pierce the man through with the Kusanagi and not have the annoyance of dealing with this Kage that constantly worried and second guessed his plan. As if he was some fool that would leave even the smallest detail unaccounted for. But perhaps the Kage should worry, he mused. After all Orochimaru only cared about Orochimaru's goals. The Kazekage and Suna could all burn as long as it got him what he wanted.

Still, Orochimaru restrained himself and didn't kill the man. The reason, which the Kazekage did not need to know about, was that Jiraiya had been spotted in Konoha for the first time in years by his spies. Though the Kazekage was a spineless worm, he was still Kage level. He did not want to be interrupted in his fight with Sarutobi. If nothing else the Kazekage could be used as fodder, along with his monster son, to keep Jiraiya out of his hair until he could deal with Sarutobi and put an end to the old fool. Yes, there might still be some use for the Kage, alive. Orochimaru however would definitely kill the man if the troublesome pig somehow survived the invasion.

"Don't worry, Kazekage-dono. We have taken care of everything. Suna and Oto will be good friends after this, and you and I my dear Kazekage will rise to the top of the Shinobi world" Orochimaru smiled at the man. "Trust me. We are allies, after all."

000

They were standing by the side of a lake near the training grounds they typically used. Hinata was standing patiently while Anko was digging around for an item she had misplaced in her coat.

"Where… dammit I coulda sworn I had it… Fuck… Ah ,here it is!" the snake Special Jounin proclaimed at last.

Hinata watched as the woman produced a totally blank sheet of paper, and thought maybe Sensei wanted to draw her some new seals or make some more explosive tags. She could feel Nigiri rolled up in the front pocket of her sweater. Feeling him there was somewhat comforting… even if she still had no real idea why Sensei had wanted her to carry him.

"Here, take it" said Anko, handing the sheet of paper over to her.

The girl looked it over. It looked just like a regular piece of paper. She looked up at her Sensei dubiously, not sure what she was supposed to do with this.

"Baka, don't you know any damn thing? This tests your elemental affinity. I need to know what it is so I know what kind of jutsu I can teach you. Just put your chakra into it. Then we'll know what kind you really are."

Hinata nodded, she was familiar with the concept. Most people had a primary element they were attuned with. The primary element was by far the one that the shinobi could use to make his most powerful Jutsus. So a Water attuned person would always have their Water element jutsu be their most powerful. However, it was also a little more complicated than that.

While a person could learn Jutsu of almost any element, in theory, usually a shinobi was incapable of producing a Jutsu that was the _opposite_element, ie the one that your principal elements was weak against. For example, an Earth user could not cast Lightning jutsu, since Earth is weak against Lightning. In a battle what elements a person was strong in and what the enemy could use sometimes played a huge outcome in battles. Like in the history books, how the Water affinity Second Hokage almost lost his life as a young man in a duel against a Rock Jounin, until he remembered to use some of the somewhat unimpressive Lightning jutsu he knew. Knowing those jutsu and his incredible skill were what saved his life, but even he had been in trouble going against a skilled user of his opposite element.

Hinata looked down at the paper in her hands and channeled her chakra into it. She assumed it would change colors or something of that sort. So Hinata yelped and dropped the sheet of paper in surprise when it suddenly caught fire.

"Wha…" Hinata stood, looking mortified. What the heck had she done?! Sensei was going to kill her!

The snake Jounin for her part was a bit surprised, but to a good extent relieved. Elemental affinity usually adhered to the personality of the person at least to some degree. By her personality, Anko had pegged Hinata as either Water or Earth. That might have been troublesome since Anko knew very few earth and could not do water Jutsu at all. But by a stroke of luck, her apprentice was the same elemental affinity as she was.

"Fire? I didn't expect that of you Hinata, you little firecracker you. What part of your personality is really like fire, I wonder? Maybe you'd be a tiger in bed, eh Hina-chan?" asked Anko with a teasing and perverted look.

"Whaa-.. whaaat!" blabbered Hinata, "Please Sensei, don't say weird things!" Hinata blushed and looked at the floor, feeling mortified and more than a bit embarrassed. Why did her Sensei have to reference such lewd things? Wasn't she too young for that? Honestly, she knew some girls her age concerned themselves with that stuff but it was the_furthest_ thing from her mind. At least the older woman didn't seem concerned about the paper burning up… she figured that was supposed to happen then.

Anko smiled. It would be fun to tease little Hina-chan it seemed. But she would leave that for later, they actually had important things to take care of today.

"Ok my little killer runt… I want you to watch carefully. This is what you're going to learn how to do."

Hinata looked up in time to catch a quick look at Sensei, before she seemingly disappeared and reappeared some twenty yards away in an instant.

There it was again. How Sensei seemed to be one place one second and them almost magically be somewhere else the next. Even for her eyes that were far more sensitive to movement than most, Hinata couldn't follow the movement one bit. It was so fast. Inhumanly fast.

"Watch again Hina-chan. Watch carefully" Anko called to her. The girl did so.

This time Hinata saw_something_. Like a small blur of color for a microsecond. But before it could even begin to really register, Sensei was standing next to her, holding a kunai pressed painfully into her back. Hinata moved away quickly and put some distance between them, mouth hanging slightly open as her Sensei seemed to just disappear and reappear like magic.

"Like it runt? I hope so since you're going to be practicing this until your feet are bloody. Now, do you know Shunshin no Jutsu?"

"Well… I know what it is Sensei. But I never learned how to do it…" she said with some embarrassment.

"Well good, because what I did _is not_ Shunshin no Jutsu (Body Flicker). In fact it's not even a Jutsu at all. It's a combat technique that lets you move at super high speed by manipulating the chakra in your legs and feet properly."

Hinata was a bit puzzled. "Well, isn't that what Shunshin no Jutsu does sensei? I thought it was the same concept, vitalize the body temporarily in order to be able to move very fast. So how is this technique different?"

Anko smiled. Ah, explanation time. "Well killer runt, there are advantages and disadvantages to this move called Body Movement compared to the more commonly known D-Ranked Body Flicker. Execution is different too,"

"In Shunshin no Jutsu, you need to use a seal to mold the chakra. At higher levels you can forget making the hand seal, but you still move your chakra in a way that screams "Jutsu!" to anyone close enough to feel it and paying close enough attention. That split second warning when you mold your chakra is why even the highest level unimaginably fast Shunshin no Jutsu are often not enough to surprise and eliminate a high level ninja. A split second can often be warning enough. Also, Shunshin no Jutsu is limited to straight line of sight movement. You can't Shunshin around a corner or a tree, for example,"

"Body Movement however does not use seals. It is a massive movement of chakra to the legs to where you build an incredible chakra "pressure" in them and then explode the chakra out of the bottom of your feet. Any fool can move chakra to his legs to move faster, but to release it all in an instantaneous burst every time you take a step takes a huge amount of control" Anko stopped for a second, and threw a kunai at Hinata, just to make sure the girl was still paying attention. The girl caught it without missing a beat. Only after she caught it did the girl's face show surprise as her eyes widened. Good. The last week hadn't been a complete waste of time after all.

"The hardest part of Body Movement however," Anko continued, "is stopping. You move at such high speeds with Body Movement that stopping instantaneously by gripping the earth with your chakra is very difficult. It's not like Shunshin no Jutsu that has a predetermined end spot you set when you cast the jutsu. And you can't slide slowly to a stop over several feet with Body Movement, otherwise the whole point of speed and surprise is completely wasted. So you _must_ learn going from extreme high speed to a complete stop in an instant. Otherwise if you actually want to strike somebody with Body Movement while taking advantage of your speed you would have to either just run into somebody at super high speed, or just cut them as you move past with no control and maybe slide into a wall. And no self respecting assassin would do something so classless, now would they?"

Hinata tossed Sensei her kunai back underhanded (she didn't want to antagonize the woman by a real throw) and Anko caught it and vanished it into her coat. It seemed so routine, it was kind of odd. Certainly like no apprentice/master relationship she knew about.

And certainly no one she knew had ever shown her anything like the Body Movement that Sensei was talking about. It seemed so good, she wondered why it wasn't used more often. Hinata asked this to Sensei.

"Well…" she began. "It's a technique that is potentially faster and move versatile than the Shunshin no Jutsu, and it is perfect of people like us since it gives additional stealth to the movement. If you are out of their line of sight there really is no jutsu feel to give you away, after all you are just moving your chakra to your legs. However it is a much more difficult technique to learn and difficult to execute. And there is one more drawback to this technique, and it's a big one. It eats up chakra. A _lot_ of chakra. Very fast. It's not something you can throw around all the time in the middle of a battle. In essence, if you haven't killed your opponent after your first Body Movement, then your plan's already gone wrong."

Hinata let this all sink in, and to her surprise felt herself getting somewhat excited at the prospect of learning the Body Movement technique. In fact she was actually very excited. Because… it felt like the first step towards her goal. This felt like the first thing she would _really_ be learning to get stronger.

"So," Hinata asked enthusiastically "how much chakra _does_ it take to use Body Movement Sensei?"

"I think in your current state Hinata… Hmm in one movement you could probably cover about twenty yards in about two steps. Doing that would drain about a third of your total chakra."

Hinata was floored. It took so much chakra she would be completely depleted after using it only three times?! That had to be at least ten or twenty times the amount of chakra it took to do a Body Flicker! Were the advantages really worth spending that much chakra?!

"Relax," Anko said "when I'm done with you all you'll need is one, and that will be enough. Now come on runt, let's get you started learning this shit."

Hinata mentally shrugged. She would just have to trust Sensei.

"Hai, Sensei."

000

That night, and for the next three nights afterwards Hinata could not sleep at all. Even as she was exhausted from hard training with her team and with Sensei, she had the most miserable and restless nights of her life.

As soon as she would fall asleep, Hinata would begin having the most terrifying nightmares she could ever remember. Sick and disturbing things that she wouldn't have thought would appear even in her worst nightmares. The first night she dreamt of her Mother, and the woman had her face in her open belly eating her intestines. Hinata woke up with a scream, horrified and crying. She stayed up weeping for a while before going back to sleep.

Then she dreamt about her sister having her breasts and sex organs removed while she was forced to watch, and then the shadowy figures doing that to her sister turned to do the same to her. She woke up again in a scream and sweat. To try to stay calm she kept thinking about how silly it was to dream that, since her sister did not even have breasts yet like she had in the dream. The dream left her shaking for a long time after.

For four long nights Hinata was raked by horrible nightmares to the point she was afraid to go to sleep. She really at one point, because of the trauma and lack of sleep with all the unforgiving training, thought she was about to lose her mind. Hinata had never had days of such haze and misery as far back as she could remember. Her teammates kept asking her what was wrong, and she told them she was having bad dreams and wasn't sleeping well for the last few days. She felt that what she said had been the biggest understatement in the history of humankind.

It totally increased her awe and fear and respect for her Sensei when she started to suspect that _she_ somehow had something to do with this. Part of her told her she was going totally insane to be blaming it on Sensei. But part of her, part of her thought it was because of that one day that she had apologized to a servant at her home by mistake. Like Sensei was some great Kami punishing her in both her dreams and waking hours… it was torture. There was no other way to describe it. It was like Sensei was a bad spirit haunting her day and night for her sins.

After it was over and ever after Anko never mentioned the one time she apologized. Hinata was left to wonder if Sensei had found out and punished her somehow in some mystical way and never said anything, or if the woman had never found out about her one slip up and those four night had been like a temporary curse or a freak occurrence. All of this happened exactly as Anko had planned, as usual.

000

**A/N:** _Next Chapter_ Finally some action will start. Another month has passed. Team 8 has completed their 50 D-Ranked missions and are ready for their first C-Rank mission abroad! Be sure to read it.

To all my readers: Thank you so much for being patient and waiting frigging long for this update. I had a lot of things going on in my life and contemplated stopping this fic altogether. However reviews and favorites and alerts kept coming, and it inspired me to keep writing for you guys. So thank you everyone who favorited the story and especially those who reviewed, you make all this possible!

So please everyone

**R&R**

It really keeps up authors motivated to keep writing and updating. Thank you!


	10. C Rank and Dango

**A/N: **Sorry for posting this a day late, I'm visiting my family and my old-school dad doesn't even have internet access -_-. I'm posting from a Starbucks. All praise free Wi-Fi! Enjoy the chapter.

_**One Month Later…**_

Hinata raced along the treetops, the world passing as a blur. She had increased her speed substantially training in the last month, but her opponent was still keeping up with her. The Hyuuga put on a burst of speed to try to get some more distance between them.

She scanned with her Byakugan and found her opponent thirty yards to her left and keeping pace with her. In the treetops the foliage was so thick there was no way her opponent could see her. The girl had no idea how the enemy could track her so well without the Byakugan… but there were still advantages with her eyes she could exploit.

The young Hyuuga palmed a kunai from her pouch and threw it in an intercept course with her opponent. At this distance and speed it would probably be off by at least a foot, but it didn't matter. She watched with the Byakugan until the blade came closest to her opponent… and used the weapon as she had been taught.

"Kai!" she screamed while forming the half-tiger seal. The result was instantaneous. The kunai exploded, buckling and shattering tree trunks from ten yards around. She lost track of her opponent, and for a second Hinata thought she might have actually caught the enemy shinobi in the blast.

A second later she spotted the enemy, now ten feet above her in the canopy and racing towards her, closing ground fast. Hinata cursed inwardly, and made a dash for the forest floor where she might stand more of a chance. The Byakugan user could not use her full speed on the tree tops yet, and her opponent had a huge advantage on her in that department.

As she landed she palmed another kunai from her pouch and threw it up at her opponent who was now jumping down after her. Hinata detonated the kunai as came within inches of her opponent. "Kai!" she said, again with the half tiger seal to detonate the custom-made tag on the handle. The blast of the explosion was so close it almost knocked her off her feet.

With her Byakugan she could see the form of the enemy disappear instantly without a trace. A Bushin. She would have groaned at wasting such a precious weapon on an illusion, but the enemy was still out there waiting for the chance to strike.

Hinata spotted one person in the trees above, and another behind her on the forest flood hidden behind a large tree. At least one of them was a Bushin, or maybe Kagebushin this time. She decided to go on the offensive, as had been repeatedly pounded into her she needed to for the last month.

The girl gathered the chakra to her feet, pulled out a kunai and launched herself at the one behind the tree. One step took her next to the tree, and with a second step she changed directions to strike.

Her kunai struck the enemy in the chest and it puffed into white smoke. Kagebushin. However Hinata had not yet really mastered how to stop instantly, and she kept going and stumbled for another five or so feet the Body Movement, struggling to stop herself. The other figure above her took the chance.

The young Hyuuga saw as the enemy jumped directly above her, and in the air went through a lightning fast series of seals. "Futon: Daitoppa!" (Wind Release: Great Breakthrough). A great gust of wind came down on top of the girl and lifted her off her feet. The girl struggled to make a seal as she was thrown around like a leaf in the wind, and was eventually slammed into a tree a good hundred feet away.

However, as Hinata's body struck the tree, her figure turned in to a log that fell harmlessly to the ground.

Hinata hid some distance away, observing the figure of her opponent as she examined the log that she had used for the substitution technique. She was breathing hard, from the Jutsu and techniques she had just used and how close she had come to getting seriously injured. Hinata concentrated on slowing her breathing down and observed her enemy as she planned what to do next.

"Not bad Hina-chan. But you must have known that Kagebushin placed so conveniently for you to use Body Movement to attack was nothing but bait" she heard a voice say behind her.

Hinata moved to whip around and turn but a hand that seemed as strong as steel grabbed her behind the neck and kept her in place. The girl arched her back painfully as the hand squeezed harder. After a second she felt almost paralyzed, and feared something in her neck might break.

"Sensei… le- let go, you win…" she pleaded somewhat painfully (and maybe pitifully) as she continued to arch her back as she tried instinctively to move to a less painful position.

"Make me" came a reply. Damn, this always ended badly.

Hinata grabbed the hand holding her neck and twisted her body so her whole weight would be against Sensei's thumb. The woman was forced to let go. At the same time she turned and brought her leg up to kick her Sensei. She ended up getting thrown and flipping once in the air, before landing on her stomach painfully.

"Well, I guess we're done for the morning. It's almost time for you to go play house with your little boyfriends anyway" Anko said, dusting off her hands before turning around and starting to walk off, "come on, let's go."

_Yea right,_ thought Hinata, _Like I'm going to fall for that again. _"Hai Sensei" she said, and dutifully got up and began to walk after her Sensei. She kept her Byakugan activated while trying to still look relaxed, though the veins around her eyes bulging kind of gave it away. Something was coming. Probably.

Not two seconds later while still looking at her Sensei's back she saw it… Sensei in front of her wasn't leaving footprints. A Bushin, most likely. She looked around quickly, knowing what to look for. And then in between the trees ahead she saw it. A well concealed trap where "Sensei" Bushin had just walked through. Hinata gave herself a small smile. That whole "we're done" and then getting attacked right after only worked on her the first couple of times.

The girl took out a kunai and was going to throw it at the mechanism of the trap… when she felt something grab her feet. She looked down. _Gloved hands_ were gripping her ankles, coming out of the earth. Her eyes went wide. She had been paying attention everywhere, except underground. Crap!

Before she could try to struggle free she was being pulled downwards, hard. However, the only thing that got pulled underground was another wood log… it ended up with just a bit of the top sticking out.

"Kawarimi… she's been getting good at that" Anko mused to herself, as she hid in the trees with a genjutsu that made her invisible to even the Byakugan. However, that only applied if she stood still. Against regular eyes, she could move and still retain a high level of camouflage. As soon as she moved an inch in this situation however, the White Eyes would spot her. Still it highlighted one of Hinata's… and the Hyuuga's… weaknesses.

_Rely too much on one tool… no matter how good it is… and it can be used against you. I wonder how much longer it's going to take her to figure out I can hide from her Byakugan? _The Snake Jounin thought to herself with some amusement.

Well, but she was getting a little bored of just going easy on the girl even if that was what was needed to train her. It was time to go at it a little bit more seriously. It was almost time for her to go meet Kurenai's little team and play genin anyways. Anko smiled to herself. She always liked to end their little sessions with a little tough love… needed to make sure the brat didn't get a big head about her progress, after all.

The older woman jumped from where she had concealed herself down to the forest floor, and then ran to where her genin was hiding. She made no effort to conceal her approach, and the Hyuuga saw her coming, readying herself for the fight.

As Anko ran full speed at Hinata, the woman dropped to the floor and slid under the girl's guard, and allowed her momentum to carry her through kicking the girl in the stomach. The girl flew back some ten feet away with a muffled cry.

While flat on the ground the girl struggled to move and get up. The girl eventually managed to get herself up to her knees, but she dubbed over and held her stomach painfully, coughing over and over again. Anko for her part frowned a little, being somewhat disappointed it had ended so fast. That kick wasn't even _quite_ what she considered to be full power. Downing her student with only one blow like that, she had to admit, was a little disappointing.

But then again, Anko reminded herself, the girl had been coming quite far from when she first started. And the runt was quite talented in her own right. The girl's chakra, stamina, speed and toughness in a fight had all improved considerably in only the five weeks they had been training. Hina-chan was also amazingly good at Fuinjutsu (seals), having surprised her with her insight into the material she had learned and skill in drawing seals a couple of times. Anko even felt confident that the girl would finally master stopping instantaneously with the Body Movement in the next few weeks, dramatically increasing how dangerous she was in a fight. That would only be a week or two longer than it had taken her to master the skill.

She also looked different. After some discreet and not so discreet hints from her, the girl decided to stop cutting her hair like a salad bowl and only leaving some long hair to frame her face. Instead she had been letting her hair grow out and it now almost touched her shoulders. The "bangs" that framed her face had also grown, going down to the about the middle of her chest. The hair made her look older, and in Anko's opinion a hell of a lot hotter. As hot as a girl turning thirteen could be at any rate. Anko smiled as she knew some boys around town had started to take notice, though her apprentice was almost completely oblivious to any of the looks she got more often now from boys her age.

Another improvement had been the wardrobe. After a couple of weeks of seeing her in different versions of the same stupid hoodie, the snake Jounin told her to get something a self respecting shinobi and assassin might actually consider being caught decomposing in a ditch wearing.

Thankfully being a Hyuuga had at least some advantages, because the girl had absolutely no shortage of funds to buy gear like many young shinobi did. The girl ended up with a thick dark blue keikogi top, made by an ex shinobi in Konoha that was as famous for his tear resistant materials as he was for his exorbitant prices. The girl's forehead protector had even been stitched directly into the upper left arm of the vest. Anko had insisted she buy the highest quality outfit she could. On the lapels she had gotten one small Tai Chi symbol in red on either side, saying it was the symbol of the Juken style. Anko made her change it to black which Hinata had not been too happy about, but the girl knew better than to argue. Bright colors, even a tiny bit could give you away if the conditions were right Anko had explained.

Underneath the girl wore a simple black top. Black shorts (much like the style her cousin Neji wears) and black shinobi sandals completed the outfit. Though Anko was not really one to worry too much about anyone's looks, she had to say she was much more pleased with Hinata in this outfit. It made her look more serious and more badass (of course Anko's apprentice _had_ to look badass). And more importantly it made her look more like an actual shinobi. With some more training, who knows? She might actually deserve the name sometime before the end of her life.

There was also another reason it was good the Hyuuga clan had such ridiculous amounts of money. Buying a new kunai every time she blew one up and constantly buying Fuinjutsu (Seal) making materials was extremely expensive. But it wasn't Anko's money, so what the hell did she care? As far as she was concerned losing a bit of money was the least possible thing that _should_ happen to the Hyuuga. Hell, what Hinata spent to replace the kunai she blew up almost every day in training was probably not one tenth of what they paid their small army of servants each and every day. She doubted anyone at the household even batted and eyelash when they saw how much she was spending.

Besides, anyone from the main house looking good with expensive equipment and clothes could only reflect favorably on the clan, even if that person was the weak discarded reject of the main branch. Yea. That made perfect sense. It made Anko want to puke… all over their pretty shoes.

As she watched her charge struggling to get to her feet, Anko suddenly sensed a presence approaching behind her. A few seconds later, she recognized the chakra. "Yo, Hayate. What you want?" she called out without turning around. One of her old teammates from her days in ANBU, a man she actually had a small bit of respect for as a shinobi.

Hinata saw the man as she struggled to her feet. She spotted who Sensei had been talking to, a Konoha shinobi standing by a tree a respectful distance away. That Sensei didn't even bother to turn around must mean that she trusted the man… or at least trusted him enough that he wouldn't attack her in the back.

On closer inspection, the man made Hinata a little concerned. He looked sick. Almost like he would collapse and keel over any minute now. This was reinforced when he broke into a fit of coughing. It made Hinata want to go over and help him… but it's not like she knew even one lick of medical ninjutsu.

After the coughing fit stopped, the man spoke. "Hokage-sama wants to see you as soon as possible Anko-san. That's all."

Anko looked over her shoulder at Hayate and actually smiled at him. "Hokage-sama have you running errands for him now Hayate? How the ANBU have fallen nowdays."

The man coughed violently a few more times before he was able to answer. "Just on a way to a mission. Finding you was a little side trip before leaving. Well, I'll be off then." The man made a hand seal and disappeared in a swirl of leaves.

As soon as Hayate had left, Anko turned and started walking in the direction of Konoha. "We're done for now, I have to go see Hokage-sama" she called without even turning around, "we'll meet tonight where we usually do. See ya runt." The woman jumped up into a tree and disappeared without waiting for a reaply.

Hinata sighed with relief, as she was not in the mood for much more training this morning. It could get rough. The girl got herself together and headed towards field 14 to meet her team…

Until she got her foot caught in a rope trap the pulled her by her ankle almost one hundred feet in the air. The girl sweatdropped as she hung there. Just had to get one more dig in before she left, didn't she? Sensei could be so immature.

000

Kurenai had supervised the team's training in the morning, being very pleased how the teamwork and the abilities of her entire team seemed to be coming along.

Shino seemed to have become the unofficial leader of the group, and though Kiba had resented it at first, the boy had grown into it after recognizing that the intelligent silent boy was indeed very good in that role. Now the three of them seemed to slide into their own roles whenever they were on a mission, Shino delegating the few times it was necessary and everyone sliding into a steady work rhythm. When one person finished their task they would go help the other without complaints, like it was natural. And the team was becoming very close. Yes, things were going very well.

Now they were walking to the Hokage's office to receive their mission for the day, though it would be a little different this time. They had been doing one or two D-Ranked missions every day. But now they were about to take on something a _little_ more challenging.

"So, anyone know how many D-Ranked missions we've done so far?" Asked Kurenai to her team as they walked slightly ahead of her.

"Pfft… I lost count Kurenai-sensei. Forty? Fifty?" said Kiba.

"We have completed 53 missions to date." Said Shino.

"That's right, 53 D-ranked missions. Does anyone know how many are needed before we are eligible for a C-Rank?" asked Kurenai.

"Fifty." Said Hinata. Kurenai smiled. Though the girl was still on the shy side and remained very soft spoken, she didn't stutter and wasn't shy to speak up within their group. There was no shyness or hesitation when she spoke to them anymore. It always pleased her a great deal to see what progress the girl made.

"Woa, so… that means we can do C-Ranked missions now, right?!" said Kiba excitedly, pumping his firsts in the air. Akamaru let out one of his cute little barks to share in his master's excitement. His reaction was not a surprise, Kirenai though amusedly. The boy made it almost a daily pastime to complain about how stupid the D-Ranked missions they were made to do were.

"Yes, that's right Kiba. Though we probably still will do a majority of D-Ranked missions as a young genin team, we will now also get some C-Ranked into the mix. I'm just letting you guys know that I officially requested we receive our first C-Rank mission today. When we get to the Hokage's office, that is what will be assigned to us." Said Kurenai.

"Kurenai-sensei," spoke Hinata "are you sure we're ready for a C-Ranked mission yet?" She didn't seem frightened by the prospect of a C-Rank mission Kurenai noted. It was more like she was concerned. The girl still had confidence problems, but she was no longer afraid to engage in any of their trainings or in things that needed to be done. It was kind of hard to be really anxious over D and C-Ranked missions when you had to train with Anko everyday, Kurenai though to herself with a small smile. Though she was not as confident as maybe Kurenai would like her to be, this Hinata was tremendously better than the shy wilting flower she had first met over a month ago.

"Don't worry Hinata," began the red-eyed Jounin, "the worst that you'll encounter in a C-Rank mission will be brigands and robbers. The highest end, maybe some civilian soldiers. Something you three should be able to handle without too many problems. And if anything goes wrong, you'll have me with you. So yes, I'm positive Team 8 is ready to handle any C-Rank mission we might encounter." Kurenai flashed a reassuring smile to the young girl.

Hinata for her part was sure the other members of her team, Kiba, Shino and of course Kurenai-sensei could handle the missions without any problems. She just worried a bit about herself. Hinata knew she could handle something as simple as what Kurenai-sensei just described… but a small part of her still wondered if she would choke when a real life situation presented itself. She signed. Well, if she could survive Sensei (remember Sensei=Anko) she supposed a bunch of brigands wouldn't have much to bring to the table.

Soon they arrived at the Hokage's tower, and went inside to receive their mission.

000

Namikaze "Naruto" Sarutobi and his team of Akimichi Choji, Yamanaka Ino (annoying fangirl!) and his uncle (not blood-related, but they had always been family since Naruto was adopted by the old man Sarutobi) Asuma were leaving the Hokage tower after receiving another C-Rank mission, this being their fifth. Naruto, being the strongest of his team and in fact the strongest of all Konoha genin, wished they could have at least a B-Rank mission. However, Asuma reminded him his team wasn't quite up to his skill level, so he kept from pestering his adopted grandfather to give him something more challenging. He could never forgive himself if he put Choji or Ino in danger in any case.

Though he would never tell that to Ino, he though with a shudder. He wasn't sure he would survive the tidalwave of declarations of love and attempted hugs plus occasional stalkings he had to put up with from his teammate on a regular basis. Ino had a lot of good qualities and he had grown to appreciate those, and he actually liked her as a teammate… but having one of your fangirls on your team really sucked. He wondered how Sasuke was doing with Sakura on his team.

The Namikaze wore what had become his staple, a long crimson trench coat with black flames at the bottom. It was much like his father's trademark duster had been, except the 4th's had been white with orange flames. Underneath he wore a long sleeved black shirt and matching crimson pants. Black sandals completed the outfit. It was a flashy costume, to be sure… but he had a flashy personality. And he had the skills to back it up. Though Naruto was generally kind and humble, much like his father had been, no one could doubt that he was one of the most talented youths in a generation.

As they headed out the last Namikaze noticed that there was a line of three or four teams waiting to get their missions… and then he did a double take when he saw the last team standing in line.

There was Kurenai who Naruto knew because she was a kind of a friend of the Sarutobi's and also from all the time she and her uncle were spending together recently. His excuses for when he went to meet Kurenai were becoming more and more lame everytime. Kurenai had also been the first one to teach him a little bit about genjutsu a few years ago.

Standing next to her were two of his old friends, loud Kiba talking loudly to Shino, and of course the stoic and quiet Shino being his other good friend.

It was the last member as he looked at her from the side that he could not recognize.

She was standing with her hands on her waist, waiting patiently and just generally looking around. Her shoulders were held back and her chest was slightly forward in an easy but confident pose. The girl looked confident and like she was really comfortable being in her body, unlike many others their own age. Her head was held high, and from what he could see from the side she looked proud and strong.

For the first time… maybe _ever,_ Naruto stopped in his tracks at the sight of a girl. Thankfully Ino was walking in front of him yammering about something so she didn't notice.

He looked at the girl again, trying to figure out who it was. Much to his exasperation she turned her head away from him instead of towards him so he couldn't look at her face.

As he looked, he noted there was a quiet confidence in the way she carried herself that told him this girl actually trained, probably trained hard down to the bone. _Unlike Sakura and Ino and every other fangirl I can think of _he thought to himself, growing more intrigued by the girl with the blueish-black hair.

Then, to his surprise, out of her keikogi crawled out a very long, very thin green and yellow snake. The girl casually stoked its head before the snake wrapped itself gently around her neck, like some kind of living choker. Everyone on her team acted like this was normal. To him, this gave this strange girl an air of further mystery, and it intrigued him. Maybe it was a ninja snake? Though he didn't know if any snake summoners existed in the village.

He grabbed Choji's arm who was walking past him. The larger boy stopped and looked at him curiously. Naruto leaned in and whispered cautiously, "Hey Choji, who is that girl with Kiba's team? Do you know?"

Choji looked over, and turned to his teammate, "What's wrong with you Naruto? That's Hinata. She was in our graduating class. We met her with Kiba and Shino's team at Ichiraku's a while back, remember?" the bigger boy pulled away and started walking after their sensei who was getting ahead of them.

Naruto for his part did a double take of the girl. _That_ was Hinata? Finally she turned more in his direction and he looked at her face, noticing her pale almost-white Hyuuga eyes. His jaw dropped. That girl was _Hinata?_

He remembered seeing her in class at the academy, how she was almost always by herself, looking down at the desk and looking like she would rather melt into the wall than be sitting in the classroom. He remembered seeing her at Ichiraku's a while ago, still looking the same. Always with that frankly ugly (though he would never be mean enough to say that) haircut, hardly having enough self confidence to look anyone in the eye, always hunched over and being painfully shy. And always wearing that white hoodie.

The girl before him seemed like someone totally different. She seemed confident, someone who obviously trained maybe as much as he did. Her hair was different (_much_ better in his opinion) and wore clothes that not only looked better but actually showed that the girl had some curves. Not many girls their age actually had curves. And now that the girl actually looked up instead of looking down all the time, the Namikaze could actually get a good look at her face. He thought she was very, very pretty.

Naruto caught himself staring, and adverted his gaze before anyone could catch him at it. But damn, he though to himself. Hinata is pretty _hot_. And the way she seemed to be so different from all the fangirls that fought for his attention intrigued him.

Unfortunately for him, the other blonde on his team had turned and had caught him looking at Hinata. Jealousy coursed though her, and she stormed over and practically dragged the Namikaze away by his arm. "Come _on_ Naruto-kun, let's go. Asuma is leaving us behind, we're going to be _late_."

"Oh… oh ok." Said Naruto intelligently, embarrassed at being caught staring and let the girl on his team drag him away.

_Hyuuga Hinata, eh? I hope we get a chance to see her again sometime… _

000

Though Hinata did now look very confident to almost everyone on the outside, the people who knew her knew that she wasn't quite as sure of herself as her outside seemed to suggest. Still, one could confidently say that she was more confident in a fight now than any of the other girls in her graduating class.

Their turn had come up, and they were now before the Hokage. The man sat on his desk in the missions hall, with Iruka sitting by his side assisting today.

"So," began the old Hokage, "time for your first C-Rank, is it? Ho, ho… well, let's see what we have available. Iruka, what do you recommend?" he said, asking his temporary assistant who held all the mission files.

"Well…" he said, scratching his head, "there aren't many C-Ranks left for today that might be appropriate Hokage-sama. The only one that looks like it would be suitable for a first time team would be a long deployment though… probably about three weeks."

The man looked over at the Hokage, who motioned for him to continue.

"Well, the client is a merchant conglomerate that operates near the border of what used to be the Village Hidden in Hot Water. Apparently a large group of bandits in the area have been growing increasingly bold. These merchants have a once per year large trading expedition along the border towns near the Hot Water Village, where these bandits operate. The merchants in this trading expedition seem to have little faith in the guards they can hire around those parts, so they requested shinobi to protect their caravan for the duration of their expedition. That would be about one week" finished Iruka.

"I see…" said Sarutobi, "So one week to travel there, one week for the mission and one week to return, is that correct?"

Iruka hesitated for a second, and then said, "Yes Hokage-sama. Perhaps we should wait for a mission of shorter duration, or one closer to home? Since it is their first time and all Hokage-sama. "

"Nonesense Iruka, Kurenai's team is perfectly capable of handling this mission. And it would be good experience for the young ones." Said the Third.

"But…" said Iruka.

"Iruka, there are risks in every mission. Being so far from any backup is worrisome, but a bunch of bandits is nothing these shinobi can't handle. They are qualified, so I am giving it to them."

"H-Hai, Hokage-sama" said Iruka, wanting to keep arguing but knowing it would be futile and rude to do so.

Kiba for his part was positively quivering with the need to make lots of noise about being given such a great mission. He would have, except Kurenai in her own way had put the fear of the Shinigami in him when the boy kept acting up in front of the Hokage. Being made to think he had been turned into a girl for a whole day with genjutsu was not something he would soon forget.

Shino… well, he was Shino. He took it in stride and would do his job carefully and methodically.

Hinata for her part, much to her surprise, was not really worried about the trip being extra long. They would be travelling inside the Land of Fire after all, it's not like a great deal could go wrong. What actually came to mind was how this would disrupt her training. Worse, she wondered if not training with Sensei everyday might somehow lessen the skills and confidence she had gained. Hinata resolved to train as much as she could while on the mission. And to be sure, being away from home for a while would be a welcome change… though being away from Sensei really wouldn't, she thought with a hint of sadness.

"Well, Team 8 would be happy to accept the mission Hokage-sama" said Kurenai on their behalf.

"Excellent. You are to leave tomorrow at dawn, so take the time from now until then to make preparations. The rest of the day is yours to do as you like. Good luck." Hinata was surprised to see him smile at them, but for some reason she thought the Hokage smiled at her specifically with a kind twinkle in his eye. "Dismissed" the leader said.

000

Hinata didn't have any camping gear of her own, so Kurenai had taken her to buy some. The boys all had the gear they needed at home, so headed there to make preparations and to enjoy their afternoon off before their three week mission began the following day.

After they had bought the gear, Hinata and Kurenai were walking together in silence trying to decide what each would do next, when Kurenai spoke up.

"So Hinata, how is the training with Anko going? I haven't seen her in almost a month, so I thought I would ask you. And so you know, whatever it is you are doing, the results are showing. You have become much more dependable Hinata-chan."

The girl blushed a little bit at the compliment. "Thank you Kurenai-sensei" she said.

Still Hinata thought, what did she say about her training? "Well…" she began, "Sensei… I mean Anko (It seemed odd calling Sensei by her name, but referring to Sensei while talking to Kurenai-sensei seemed confusing) is pretty much like you said Kurenai-sensei. Some days I still feel like I'm going to die in training, to tell you the truth" the girl said with a smile. Kurenai noticed this. Good. If the girl could smile at that it meant a lot… it meant she had gotten a lot tougher. And it also meant she trusted Anko not to kill her for real. It also meant they had bonded a lot closer than probably either of them realized. For a second Kurenai felt a small pang of jealousy, but quickly put it down. Both of them really needed this. She was really happy for both of them.

"But… in truth I'm afraid I'll end up disappointing Anko-sensei one of these days" Hinata confided, this time dropping her gaze. "She asks a lot of me. I just… I just hope I don't disappoint her, that's all." All of a sudden Hinata found herself getting emotional talking about this. In a way Hinata felt that disappointing her father and her family was at the root of all the problems she had with them, and why she was now a veritable outcast within the Hyuuga. The idea of the same thing happening with Anko-sensei… was almost too much to bear.

As if sensing her inner turmoil Nigiri once again crawled out of her vest and wrapped itself around her neck, nudging her chin with his head. It made her calm down a little, having the affectionate thin snake with her. That's right, she had to remember Sensei wasn't her father. Anko-sensei had faith in her and kept pushing her, even when she screwed up. Even if it was sometimes… she didn't want to use the word cruel… how she did it, the fact was that Anko-sensei never once accepted that she couldn't do something and kept pushing her to the next level, kept pushing her to get it right, telling her the whole time that she could indeed do it (always in her own peculiar way). And after a while Hinata started to believe it. It was because of that attitude that she had been to come as far as she had with Sensei's training.

Still… the fear of disappointing someone and being tossed aside because of it was very deep rooted in her…

Kurenai put her arm around the girl as they continued to walk, which surprised Hinata. She looked up at her other sensei questioningly.

"Don't worry Hinata. Anko and Team 8, me and Kiba and Shino will always be there for you. We don't support you because of how strong you are or what you can do for us. We support you because you are our comrade, and there are strong bonds between us. So don't worry about it, ok? Even if you do disappoint one of us, you'll get it right next time, isn't that right? And none of us will stop supporting you just because of that" said Kurenai reassuringly.

Hinata looked down, and a little smile crept up on her face. "Thanks Kurenai-sensei."

It was Kurenai's turn to smile. She loved helping the girl when she could. "You're welcome Hinata."

000

Hinata found her Sensei waiting for her at the designated time in the field they always met. The woman was sitting up on a tree branch, reading a book. As Hinata approached she got a closer look at it. _Icha Icha Paradise? What kind of book is that?_ The girl wondered.

As if reading her mind, Anko spoke without looking up. "It's a book a pervy acquaintance of mine has been reading for years. The curiosity finally got to me and I decided to give it a chance. The smut isn't all that bad actually. Who would have thought this kinda stuff could have come from that lame-ass Jiraiya."

The older woman snapped the book closed and looked down at Hinata. "The fact I knew the author fairly well kind ruins the whole thing for me though. So I heard you got your first mission. Tell me about it."

Hinata began, "Well…"

"Wait, hold it until later. I haven't eaten today, and I better not run you too ragged for tomorrow or Kurenai will be barking up my shit when you guys get back. She can be a pain in the ass when she wants to be. Anyway, let's eat first and do a bit of training afterwards, then we'll be done for the night." Said the snake woman.

Going to eat? With sensei? The idea was kind of odd to her. She had never done anything with sensei or been anywhere with her outside of training. But, it's not like she was going to refuse.

"Oh… ok sensei" she said.

"Follow me then." The woman disappeared the curious little orange book somewhere in her jacket and jumped down off the tree. Without waiting for her she started walking back to town. Hinata followed behind her. They walked in silence for a few minutes

When they were getting closer to town, Anko stopped suddenly. Hinata looked up at her curiously.

"Hinata," the woman spoke, "I want you to Henge (transformation technique) into some generic chunin. It wouldn't do to have us seen walking together all throughout Konoha" Anko gave her a meaningful look, "mostly because it would go bad for you if it became common knowledge. We'll head to the civilian sector of town, and there you can drop the Henge and maybe just change your eye color. It shouldn't be a problem since shinobi typically don't go there."

Hinata looked up at her oddly. She was going to ask why but Anko cut her off and stalked off walking. "Hurry up, we don't have all day."

Puzzled, and instantly worried something was wrong, Hinata used Henge and made herself a plain looking dark haired, brown eyed woman in a chunin vest. She followed her Sensei as they walked into Konoha.

Hinata got the distinct feeling from Sensei that she should stay quiet until they got into the civilian sector of the village, so Hinata kept her peace. She then remembered the warning that Kurenai-sensei had given her when she first started training with Anko… that she should make sure her family didn't know Anko was training her. There was indeed, it seemed pretty clear, some kind of connection between Sensei and her clan, given her knowledge of the clan and of the Juken. But was skulking though town in disguise really necessary? Was it really all that serious?

The young Hyuuga looked around as they progressed through town and started to notice something odd. A lot of the shinobi, especially many of the older ones, were giving sensei dirty looks. Some of them even gave her openly hateful looks to the girl's utter surprise. Occasionally groups of people would whisper to each other as the woman walked past, looking to Hinata for all the world like a bunch of gossiping academy students. Occasionally a hateful, suspicious or pitying gaze would find its way to her, seemingly only because she was walking with Sensei. What was going on?

She even once heard one old woman who was sweeping the front of her store yell at them as they passed by, "Snake whore!" With one sharp look from Anko the civilian woman (probably an ex shinobi) dropped her broom and ran back into the store.

Except for that one incident, the whole time Sensei completely ignored the reactions of people and walked along as if she didn't notice and didn't have a care in the world. Hinata wondered if that was truly how she felt.

Eventually they moved out of the shinobi and shinobi serving sections of Konoha, and moved into the part of town that was purely only civilian. The people who lived here were ones who farmed in the surrounding area, as well as potters, carpenters, makers of clothes, and just about everything a town needed that was non-military. There were clothing shops and pottery shops and all the rest in the shinobi section of Konoha that just existed to serve the shinobi population, but the establishments in this side of town were primarily to serve the needs of civilians. Shinobi rarely ventured over here without good reason, simply because they usually didn't have a reason to. Equal or better quality of just about everything was available in the area where the shinobi lived.

"You can change your Henge to what we discussed now Hinata" said Anko.

The girl complied, did another Henge that restored her back to her normal looks, except now she had brown colored eyes.

Eventually Anko led them into a small restaurant almost at the far edge of town. It was a small place, only with five tables, and a burly looking bear of a man as the proprietor that looked to be in his early fifties. The place was completely deserted.

"Sup gramps" said Anko as she walked in and went to sit down in the table furthest from the door.

"Sup kid. How's your ugly face treating you?" the man replied.

"Same as always. Still getting laid more than you. How's business?"

"It was just fine until you walked in. The usual?"

"Yea. And an extra two orders of dango and some miso soup while you're at it."

"Sweetheart, you got it."

"Yea yea, I know I'm hot, just get on with it grampa."

Hinata for her part was a little taken aback by the whole exchange. It certainly hadn't been how she was raised to interact with people. The whole actually seemed to be very rude and crass to her. But they were obviously friends, if not friendly at least, so she decided to just not say anything.

Besides, she had more pressing questions in mind. Like for example, why did so many of the villagers seem to have a problem with Sensei?

The man came back with a tray with three bottles of hot sake and a glass of milk. Anko looked at the glass of milk as he placed it in front of Hinata and placed her hand in front of her mouth to keep from bursting out laughing. For once, Hinata wasn't amused. A glass of milk? Really? Add that to the fact that she hated drinking milk.

"Stop scowling Hinata, it's just Yonta's idea of a joke. It's just 'cuz you're a kid, get it? Hehe it's pretty funny though, gotta admit" the older Jounin said with a grin. Hinata, as said previously, didn't find it very funny at all.

And to her surprise Hinata realized she was scowling, just like her Sensei said she had been. Huh? When had she ever scowled in her life?

Hinata pushed the glass of milk aside and just watched while her Sensei downed one of the three bottles of sake (it didn't take long). Then as Hinata was going to ask what was on her mind, her Sensei beat her to it. "So, tell me about this mission. First C-Rank? Exciting I guess," it was pretty clear Sensei did not think it was the least bit exciting, "at least you wont be in any danger of scooping up shit as part of the mission at any rate." Hinata shuddered as she remembered some of the farm work they had had to do.

"Well," the girl began "not much to tell really. It's a three week mission, with one week travel time each way. Some merchants want protection from some large bandit group in the area. It'll be close to the border with the former Village Hidden in Hot Water. Other than that…" the girl shrugged, indicating there was not much else to tell.

The snake woman started in on her second bottle of sake before she spoke, "Well, turns out our honeymoon is over on my side too sweet thing, I'm back on missions and active duty. Don't get me wrong, training you can be fun but I don't want my skills to get rusty, you know? And not killing for over a month can feel somewhat unnatural after a while" she said, pausing long enough to take another couple of shots of sake. Hinata's eye's widened slightly as she realized just how fast her sensei was going though those three bottles of sake.

"So, I got a mission too, leaving tomorrow. Maybe a three week job in total. Exercising our craft, some Lord's advisor in Waterfall that has been diverting some funds into his own pocket and messing around with the Lord's wife. However the advisor… stupid dumbass… is from an old family and too well connected for anything to be done in the open. Naturally because of politics a Waterfall shinobi can't be used. So if the guy is found dead by obvious assassination no one can point the finger at the Lord but all will fear him and think twice about crossing him. Yatta yatta yatta, political points in the favor of the Lord, you know the same old story that plays out every time. Run of the mill hit job. You'd think people would learn not to piss off the powerful by messing with their wives and daughters and stealing from them, but none of these guys ever seem to learn." The woman took another long drink and finished her second small bottle of sake.

Hinata for her part, was kind of happy that Sensei would share so much about her mission. It made her feel like a confidant, and that kind of trust felt really good. In her own way, Hinata realized, Sensei had been trying to be nice to her and open up to her a little bit today. Or at least she thought so and hoped she wasn't reading too much into everything.

The girl felt she should reciprocate, say something about her own life or something, though nothing good to say came to mind. Maybe she should think of something to ask Sensei? Suddenly Hinata felt very socially inept.

Well, she guessed asking what she was wondering about instead would _probably_ be good enough. "Sensei," she began, "I noticed that a lot of people seemed to… be somewhat hostile to you. At least some people did as we walked across town. It's almost like… some of the shinobi have something against you. Why is that Sensei? Did something… happen?" she asked.

Anko picked up her third bottle of sake and was eyeing Hinata out of the corner of her eye. Obviously the woman was deciding what she was going to tell her so Hinata just sat in silence and waited. Eventually the snake Jounin stopped looking at her and to Hinata's shock drank the entire contents of the sake bottle right out of the bottle in a single go, not even bothering to pour it in a glass first. When she was done she yelled over he shoulder, "Another round when you get out here gramps!" The girl didn't hear a reply.

The woman crossed her arms and crossed her legs as she readied to speak. That was a surprise, it made Sensei actually look very feminine and well… she was always a good looking woman Hinata supposed but it was not something she actually took note of until this minute. It kind of jarred her that her Sensei was actually an attractive woman and she had never noticed before. It was do unlike Kurenai-sensei who was a downright gorgeous woman who no one would ever fail to notice. She supposed being scared to death of her all the time while training and Sensei acting as _un_feminine as possible all the time were why she had never really noticed before.

"I'm going to give it to you straight, because I'm not a big fan of bullshit," Sensei began. Oh yea, thought Hinata, the cursing also threw the femininity out the window. "My Sensei was Orochimaru" she said, opening her hands in a 'so what' gesture.

Sensei looked at her like it should explain everything. It didn't. It sounded like she had heard the name someplace, but at the moment she had no idea who that man was. Obviously what she was thinking showed in her face because Anko made an exasperated sigh and rolled her eyes.

"Orochimaru? Hello? One of the three legendary Sannin? Hero of the Second and Third Great Ninja Wars? The greatest traitor this village has ever known? Damn you stupid girl, what the hell are they teaching you bratty fucks at the academy nowdays?" Anko made an exasperated sound and looked like she was getting more and more upset.

It stung Hinata to hear Sensei calling her stupid, but Hinata understood that the woman was just getting upset and Hinata was confident enough to feel pretty sure her Sensei didn't really mean it like that. But that she was the former apprentice of a man turned traitor didn't fully explain why she was so disliked by others in the village. The girl stayed silent and waited to see if Sensei would contribute anything else… she didn't feel comfortable enough to prod her further when she was this upset.

Eventually, Anko continued, "So while I was his apprentice I did some pretty stupid things for Orochimaru. I didn't really realize the consequences of what I was doing, or what a real twisted fuck of a traitor my sensei was at the time. Maybe I should have known. But in any case, people just won't let that shit go. And the end result is the shit you saw," she turned her body towards the kitchen and screamed"YONTA! HURRY UP WITH THAT GODDAMN SAKE!"

The girl got the impression that Sensei didn't want to talk about this anymore, and it was clearly a sensitive issue. But the girl couldn't help but feel bad for her Sensei. She could sort of see herself in her Sensei's position when the woman had been younger. Truth be told Hinata thought with a little shame, she knew she would do almost anything her Sensei asked her to do, even if it was something she didn't particularly want to do. That's what a Sensei and student relationship was supposed to be like. The student trusted the Sensei, was devoted to the Sensei, and obedience was expected. It seemed kind of cruel to her that Sensei would still be paying for pretty much doing what was expected of you to do.

The girl suspected there was more to the story… but she knew she had gotten as much info today as she was going to get. If she was patient, maybe she would find out more at some other time.

Hinata wanted to find something to say to express how she felt, that she felt her Sensei was being treated unfairly by the villagers who held a grudge, but before she'd come up with anything Yonta had come back carrying a very large tray.

Hinata's eyes almost popped out of her head as she saw what the man started putting on the table. There were eight large plates completely _covered_ with skewers of dango, each plate piled up with a little mountain of them. They each also got a small bowl of Miso soup… she guessed so her taste buds wouldn't burn out from sweetness overload after a couple of plates of dango. Anko got more sake and she thankfully got a glass of water.

The man left and Hinata stared at the feast before her. That's it? They were just going to eat a mountain of dango?

Sensei's sour mood seemed to have disappeared almost at once, her eyes having little stars in them and rubbing her hands greedily as she looked at the dango before her. "Let's eat!" she exclaimed, and started digging in.

Well, the moment to say anything about what Sensei had told her had passed, and Hinata felt a little sad she had not said anything supportive or reassuring to her. But it just felt awkward now… so Hinata tentatively picked up a dango skewer and started eat.

It was… surprisingly good.

000

After they had finished eating and Anko had made Hinata pay by putting it on the credit her family had in every business in town (the girl was a little mortified but Anko insisted no one would really notice or care… and she was probably right Hinata realized) the two left for the outskirts of town. Anko said she wanted to show Hinata something for her to train on while she was away on her mission.

They arrived in a clearing in the woods, and Anko motioned to Hinata to stand next to her.

"Watch this" Anko said with one of her trademark you-don't-know-what-I'm-thinking-but-it-could-be-violent smiles. Hinata was glad the tension of their earlier conversation seemed to be forgotten now. Very slowly the woman did a series hand signs deliberately. Dog. Money. Hare. Tiger.

Anko inhaled and took a huge breath into her lungs.

"Katon: Wakai Kasai no Jutsu!" (Fire Style: Young Fire Jutsu).

The Special Jounin blew out a ball of fire out of her mouth that went about three feet in front of her. She kept blowing fire in a steady stream with the flames going everywhere in front of her and stopping after about three feet. It looked like a small flamethrower coming out of her mouth. After about five seconds the Jutsu stopped.

"This is one of the most basic of Katon jutsu. It's not used for much other than maybe lighting a campfire most of the time, and most people don't even bother teaching it. It certainly isn't a combat jutsu. It can however be used for training. Now watch again" said Anko.

Hinata watched as Sensei went though the same seals again slowly. Dog. Monkey. Hare. Tiger. She took a deep breath and blew out.

"Katon: Wakai Kasai no Jutsu!"

What came out this time wasn't something that looked like a small flamethrower, but a tight beam of fire. The fire coming out of Anko's mouth looked almost like a welding torch, it was so thin and so straight. This time the flame extended almost seven feet this time, ending in a small of fire the size of maybe a child's fist at the end. Hinata looked on with her mouth open as Anko executed the technique for a handful of seconds and then terminated it.

"So, that's what I wanted to teach you. The tighter the beam, the more degree of control you need. This will also train you to use the fire element while improving your control. There is a particular Jutsu I want to teach you. But you won't be able to have a chance in hell of learning it until you master this one" said the Jounin.

So Hinata had to learn this one before she learned a more advanced jutsu. It seemed logical. "So, can I try it now Sensei?" she asked.

Anko didn't show it, but inside she was pleased. The girl was starting to show a little initiative. "By all means, go for it."

The Special Jounin was glad to see the girl actually paid attention to what she had been doing. She went through the hand signs. Dog. Monkey. Hare. Tiger. The girl took a deep breath, and blew out.

"Katon: Wakai Kasai no Jutsu!" (Fire Style: Young Fire Jutsu).

What came out of Hinata's mouth was only a lot of black smoke. At the end of the jutsu Hinata was a little surprised by what had happened, and inhaled sharply by accident. She sucked in a lot of smoke, and started coughing violently because of all the smoke in her lungs. Anko for her part was cracking up, trying to keep from falling over laughing.

"Hahaha, Hinata… you should HeheHAHAHA… oh wait that was too… hehe…" the woman couldn't help but laugh, what the girl had done had the most rookie of rookie of mistakes and to choke on her own smoke… it was just too much.

"Hina-chan… haha Hina-chan… thanks for that entertainment," began Anko as the girl was still having coughing fits and her face was turning red, "but before you are so eager to try out a new Jutsu, you should ask exactly how to do the Jutsu. There is often more than just hand seals involved, especially with elemental jutsus."

The coughing fits of the girl had stopped and she was looking up at her Sensei with a miserable face. The woman smiled. She was a bit of sadist, she had to admit. "OK, I'll tell you what you did wrong. With fire style jutsu, the hand seals alone aren't enough. To have to deliberately will the fire into existence at the same time. The fire is created from your chakra by your will, it doesn't just happen automatically. Without the strong will to create the fire, all you get is smoke… like what you just did!" Anko proclaimed with a grin.

"O-Ok" Hinata finally managed, her voice hoarse. Honestly, she was glad she was getting thicker skin. Sensei could be so… insensitive sometimes. Really.

"Little Killer-chan, with Katon jutsus that come out of your mouth, you have to will the fire into existence in your belly. Then when you exhale, have the fire come out of your belly and out your mouth. And that should be enough for you to figure it out." Said the older woman. She thought for a second, then added, "One more thing about this Jutsu. It's really unusual because the hand seals can be done even with a few seconds in between them. Just some info, it might come in handy sometime. Alright Killer-chan, show me what you got."

"H-Hai Sensei. I'll try it again then" said the girl, now more or less fully recovered. She took a few breaths to calm herself and began again. Hinata made the seals again, took a deep breath, and willed the fire to come into existence in her belly.

"Katon: Wakai Kasai no Jutsu!"

What came out this time was a lot of smoke again, except this time some sparks came out of her mouth as well. She held the jutsu for about five seconds before she had to terminate it. Smoke and some sparks. She didn't know if she should be happy she had gotten some sparks or if she should be disappointed it was so far off from what it was supposed to look like.

She looked over at Sensei to see her reaction. The woman was nodding her head approvingly. Hinata's heart soared and leapt to her chest. Yes! She almost wanted to pump her fist in the air… except she thought she'd look kind of silly doing it.

"That's good enough twerp. If you can get sparks then you just need to keep practicing to get the full flames. Only after that you can practice tightening the beam" the older woman said. Hinata looked at her, and though that the woman seemed distracted by something. Abruptly the Jounin turned and walked off. "That's all I wanted to teach you," she called as she walked away "master it by the time you get back. And don't forget to practice Body Movement and finish mastering that. See you in a month kid."

Hinata was a bit taken aback by her Sensei's abrupt leaving. The woman was just unpredictable. The girl got her wits back about her as her Sensei was at the edge of the clearing. She called out, "Hai Sensei! Thank you! Good luck on your mission!". The woman waved with one hand without turning around, and then she was gone.

The girl sighed, all alone in the dark woods now. Nigiri wasn't with her now, he had gone off somewhere by himself. Suddenly she felt a bit lonely. The girl shook the feeling off and started heading back home. She needed to get ready for tomorrow. It was going to be a big day.

000

The girl arrived at the gates a few minutes before dawn, and found her whole team already waiting for her. Kiba looked excited and anxious. Shino seemed to be, predictably, like Shino always was, calm and not showing any emotion. Kurenai was leaning against the gate with her eyes closed. As they saw her approach they all greeted her.

They all had their packs with all the supplies they needed, and everything was set. Hinata looked at the city gates. In all truth, she had never been more than a few miles from Konoha her whole life. She adjusted her pack, and tried to ease some of the nervousness she felt. It was allright. She could handle this.

"Allright team. Let's head out" said Kurenai. The woman turned and walked out through the gate. The boys followed behind her without a word. Hinata turned to take one last look at Konoha, and then walked out after them.

000

**A/N:** Wow, this is the longest chapter I've written by far. Hope it was not too long for anyone.

Next Chapter: I try to stay away from a lot of FF cliché's , but in the coming chapter I'm going to fully indulge in one; the first C-Ranked mission gone wrong. Predictable maybe, I will make it entertaining. Wait for it. And don't forget to review while you wait for it =)

THANK YOU everyone who reviewed last chapter. It really is a huge motivator for authors, and a great pleasure for us. I welcome constructive criticism as well, or compliments, or pretty much anything you want to jot down! I just really love hearing from you, my readers. That's all =]


	11. First Blood

000

The week of traveling had been uneventful. Fire Nation was the most heavily populated of the five great nations, but it still had huge swaths of raw untamed wilderness.

The team had traveled ninja mode from dawn until noon, racing along the treetops of the impressive trees that covered most of Fire Country. At noon they took a break for lunch, and then walked civilian speed until nightfall. This was a standard way of travel for making good time and keeping the shinobi as rested as they could.

Hinata for her part had spent those walking hours practicing her new Jutsu every few minutes. At first her teammates tried to persuade her to save her strength, but there was no other time for training and she was used to long hours of it. After a couple of days they stopped trying to persuade her to slow it down and the boys actually started doing some training of their own while they walked. Though she was concerned that they would be too tired to respond to an emergency like this, Kurenai let it slide because the probabilities of encountering trouble were so low. And it seemed to build their teamwork and comradery. Plus, she inwardly suspected the boy's esteem for the girl went up a notch when they got to see her work ethic first hand.

When they struck camp at nightfall they cooked a quick meal and a few of the nights Kiba or Shino managed to catch a hare to add to the small field cooking pot they carried. After eating Hinata would go off and train until she was so tired she stumbled back into camp and positively collapsed on her sleeping bag. By silent agreement her three teammates let her have the last watch, which was the easiest one to take. She needed it most, the girl pushed herself hard. Kurenai was a little worried about it, but the red-eyed woman was very proud of the shy girl.

By the end of the sixth night Hinata had mastered Katon: Wakai Kasai to the point she could create the flamethrower-effect rather well. She had even managed to improve her Body Movement a bit as well, though she had not yet managed to master stopping. In the morning of the seventh day they arrived at the walled town of Goro, where their client awaited them.

000

As the team entered the town, one of the first things they noticed was that the place was too small to have the impressive walls that it did. This town looked to Kurenai to have maybe about 10,000 inhabitants. Not a little farming village by any means, but certainly not a town you would expect to be surrounded by strong sturdy walls. As they walked in and across town they noticed a surprisingly large amount of armed soldiers with the crest of a local garrison.

Kiba looked around and tried to see what information he could gather about this place. As he looked and smelled he could pick up an undercurrent of fear in the people walking the streets. Nothing overt, but like an underlying uneasiness. It made him wonder if something was up with this town, and if it had anything to do with all the soldiers. Also, annoyingly predictably, most of the men they walked by would either do a double take on sensei or stop and openly stare. He never thought being popular with the opposite sex could be a bad thing but being a totally hot chick totally had its drawbacks. Hell seeing all the men acting like idiots was annoying _him_, and he wasn't even the target of their shameless ogling. Kiba had always thought that Naruto and Sasuke were crazy for complaining about so much female attention, but after experiencing some of that with sensei he now felt a bit sorry for the two fan girl magnets.

"So, where are we going Kurenai-sensei?" Kiba asked.

"On the other side of town is the headquarters of Traders Guild. Our client is there. Keep your eyes open and don't get lost" she said.

Kiba rolled his eyes. Yea, like anyone in this town could be a threat to shinobi. Why didn't she just whip out the kiddie leashes to make sure they didn't get lost? Kurenai-sensei was always like this, she was usually cool but on missions she sometimes treated them like children. It was kind of annoying.

They finally arrived at a two story building, not very fancy but well maintained and practical. "Land of Fire Trading Guild chapter 117" was posted over the door.

Inside the receptionist directed them to them to the office of the Guild Master for their chapter. Kiba caught the dirty look the female receptionist gave Kurenai-sensei after they turned to walk away. _Geez, she gets crap from both the men AND the women. Maybe being super good looking and popular isn't all it's cracked up to be. These people all have these really strong reactions and they don't even know a damn thing about Kurenai-sensei. What kind of stupid crap is that? _

Thankfully, the Guild Master didn't make an idiot out of himself like so many people did. He just saw a widening in the man's eyes as he saw Kurenai in surprise, but then he regained his composure and acted completely normal and professional. He had a kindly face, and smelled of cinnamon and vanilla and saffron. That was unusual. Spice traders maybe?

"Well," began the Guild Master, "thank you all for coming." Points for him for not saying anything about them being 'kids', thought Kiba. "I suppose I'll give you a little background as to our little problem here and why you have been called. As you may know, these towns here on the border are far from the shinobi village, Konoha, so if we ever need aid it takes at the earliest two weeks for it to arrive. Many sought to take advantage of this by attacking us and fleeing long before any help arrived, so the bigger towns along the border developed their own system of soldiers and defensible walls… all approved and sanctioned by the Fire Lord of course… to deal with sporadic raids of bandits and occasionally rouge militias from the nearby Land of Hot Water,"

"As a result moving valuable cargo has always been tricky, but manageable," he continued, "a large armed escort was often enough to protect the valuables. That was, until recently… when someone seems to have organized most of the bandits and miscreants of the region into one super sized band cutthroat bandits. The problem has become considerable. It went from bands consisting of 20 or 30 brigands to now a group that we estimate has around three hundred members."

Kiba could see the scale of their problem now. He doubted they could hire more than a few dozen guards from a town this size. Such a size force would not be enough to deal with three hundred armed bandits. It made Kiba sweat a little hearing those numbers. Sure, he could handle ten, maybe twenty non shinobi without a problem. But what if he had a hundred falling on him? That might be a different story. This mission might prove just a tad more tricky than they had originally anticipated.

"There are five major towns out here in far west fire country, all of them roughly the size of this one," the man continued, "and we do our yearly trading run from here to all the four other towns. It is essential economically for the Guild, and for the towns as well. We also trade a great deal of medical supplies that are imported, so from a humanitarian point of view it is also imperative that this trip succeeds. Our caravan will carry medicine, gold and jewels, spices, and a great deal of cash currency for the trading. It is the largest such prize all year long, and there is no doubt the bandits will be tempted to attack it. So please, protect our trade caravan from these men."

000

The caravan left the following morning at dawn. It was quite impressive for something that happened every year amongst what was essentialy a backwater of Fire Nation. Twelve oversized wagons requiring a pulling team of six oxen each were completely ladden with spices, currency in the form of Fire Nation capital as well as precious metals and stones, clothes, huge hundred gallon barrels of fine wines, chewing tabacco, a great deal of weapons, and most importantly a very generous ammout of medicines. Every wagon was as big as a small house. Hinata inspected every cart discretely with her Byakugan as she had been instructed to. Everything seemed in order and nothing out of the ordinary. That is until her gaze fell in one of the wagons near the rear where a man and a young woman were... Hinata's face turned beet red as she realized what she was seeing. She quickly deactivated her Byakugan and turned her gaze away, face burning hot and mortified.

She felt a hand land on he shoulder and a soft voice say, "Hinata". The girl gave a startled yelp and jumped a little, surprised and horrified that someone maybe thought she had been peeping. The genin looked up to see Kurenai looking down at her curiously and with a slightly worried frown.

"Hinata, you ok?" the Jounin queried.

Hinata nodded a bit awkwardly, turning her face away to try and hide her still increasing blush. "Hai Kurenai-sensei. Just got done peeking... err observing all of the wagons. Nothing... suspicious to report." The girl gulped and tried to look casual.

Kurenai smiled and had to keep herself from snickering. She had seen the man in his 30's and his young wife getting into the back of the waggon, clearly having other things than the day-long trip in mind. It was so fun to be in love.

"Well Hinata... just make sure to keep looking at them from time to time. You should watch if anything changes" said the Red-eyed Jounin.

The girl blushed and even more impossible shade of tomato red and nodded her agreement that she would comply. The girl had seen what she had suspected, Kurenai thought somewhat amused. Kurenai swiftly walked away, a grin spreading across her lips. The girl had to learn about this sort of thing sooner or later. Kurenai shook her head, feeling just a little bit guilty at her amusement. Was she going to start enjoying making her students uncomfortable like Anko did? Surely not.

I mean she did have a legitimate reason to order the Genin to peek once in a while. Hinata did need to keep an eye on things in case of anything suspicious. Right?

Right.

Though Kurenai doubted very the girl would observe that particular wagon too closely.

It would be the morning of the third day before they arrived at their first destination. Within a few minutes the caravan and the shinobi were underway.

000

It was on the second day that the bandits attacked.

Kurenai knew they were there long before they attacked of course. To shinobi senses, especially those of a Jounin, a group of men stumbling about in the woods was about as subtle as setting someone on fire to get their attention. They were waiting in ambush in maybe a hundred yards away off the right side of the road.

To Kurenai's senses, there were good news and bad news. The good news were that the bandits had only positioned themselves on the right side of the road, and not on both sides. Her team would not have to worry about enemies in front and behind. There was also the advantage that there was about thirty feet of flat ground between the path the caravan was taking and the edge of the woods making for an easy place to fight.

The bad news was that the Guild Master had been right about the size of the bandit gang. There must be around two hundred people hidden in the woods, lying on their stomachs waiting for the caravan to wonder right up to them. That was way more than she wanted to face in an open brawl. She was going to have to pull out all the stops.

Kurenai yawned dramatically and covered her mouth with her hand. It looked natural, but it was the signal they had agreed upon to alert each other about an upcoming ambush. Since Kurenai was at the front of the caravan, at least one of her students behind her would see it and make sure the message was passed on to all the shinobi in code. A few moments later she heard Akamaru yip. That was the signal that the message had been received by all of them.

This mission was going to be a little bit more dangerous than your average C-ranked. Kurenai had to trust her students could handle themselves against bandits, because in this flood of bodies it was going to be very hard to quickly dance across the battlefield to help any of her students in trouble. The best she could do would be to reduce the number of combatants as much as she could.

For Kurenai it would be a huge drain of Chakra, but with a simple genjutsu spread over a large area she could probably incapacitate about half the bandits before they even got up off the forest floor. The caravan was maybe fifty yards away from the ambush site now.

Kurenai moved herself to the side of the cart opposite the bandits so she would be hidden from view. Then she made some deliberate hand seals, ones for a wide spread genjutsu that should put around a hundred of them in to a deep sleep. There was a limit to how many people the jutsu could affect, and it would be a huge drain of chakra, but it would neatly cut their opponents in half.

She completed the jutsu and cast it over the area she knew the bandits were hidden. Kurenai could feel the jutsu taking effect as the chakra pathways in their brains were forced to slow in the same way as one did when sleeping. They would not be waking up for a while now. Good she thought, the situation should be much more manageable now.

Still that left about a hundred armed cutthroats. She and her students would be busy.

As the caravan passed by the ambush site, a blood curling battlecry came from where the bandits were hidden.

000

Hinata's hands were sweating. Her breathing came a little fast. She was anxious, and if she was honest she was also scared. Unless you decided to count some of her times with Sensei, Hinata had never been in a fight for her life. A kill or be killed fight. Well she didn't _have _to kill anyone, but they sure as heck would be trying their best to kill her.

The girl heard the blood curling cry from the woods. It had the intended effect, it made her freeze and it frightened her. Then the men started pouring out of the woods like ants out of a kicked over anthill.

They were all dirty, sweaty men with a collection of rusty blades and hard leathery skin. The closest one to her screamed and charged, eyes almost feverish with bloodlust and battle fury. The man came straight at her and swung as if to cut her in half with a big rusty cutlass.

Hinata's body moved, and it was almost laughably easy to get out of the way. The world suddenly became slow motion in her eyes. The man had to have had no training whatsoever. There was a shocked look on his face when the man realized his blade did not make contact with his intended target. He was so committed to the swing and so overbalanced Hinata was almost positive the man would fall to the ground on his own even without any help from her.

There were so many openings Hinata could pick and choose to strike whatever she wanted. She slapped the man in the upper back with a strike of her Juken. Such a strike would inflame the nerves of his spinal chord and would mostly paralyze all his limbs and torso for the next six to twelve hours. The man fell like a brick, the bloodlust and fury in his eyes replaced by confusion and fear.

Hinata almost laughed, to think that the man's look of violence had intimidated her a little bit, and with almost no effort all the bravado turned into helpless fear. It had been so easy!

She was so distracted she almost missed the man that thrust at her with a spear. Hinata produced a kunai and parried the blade, moving quickly along the shaft to get up close to the bandit. His face registered surprise when the girl was right on top of him, but before he could react Hinata struck. She hit his neck in a half dozen places inside a second. It was not a Juken move you could pull off in combat against a shinobi, but against a bandit it proved no problem. The blood flow to his brain was slowed so much that he passed out, but not slowed enough where he would die. Another one incapacitated.

Hinata bit her lip, and smiled. She could do this. This felt good. She liked this. Losing herself in her training, once again she let the world melt away as she flung herself into a group of bandits. Against the lavender whirlwind none of them stood a chance.

000

Things were going surprisingly well for the caravan as the fight progressed. Along with her and her genin team, there had also been twenty hired disciplined soldiers with them. These soldiers proved to be more than a match for the bandits one on one. Along with four shinobi as backup, one hundred bandits were proving to be not as dangerous as they originally seemed.

Kurenai stayed close to the formation of soldiers and kept herself busy by keeping them from being surrounded and overwhelmed by superior numbers. The soldiers positioned themselves between two of the house-size wagons in an attempt to keep from getting surrounded. Whenever a group went to try and flank the soldiers and overwhelm them, Kurani was there, flashing with her kunai. She preferred to incapacitate but she was a Jounin and honestly wasn't too picky about it either way. Half of those that ran in to her ended up dead and the rest ended up so injured they could not continue to fight.

Live by the sword, die by the sword. No one ever made it to Jounin if they were squeamish about taking life in combat.

Because the combat wasn't really intense by shinobi standards, especially by Jounin standards, Kurenai risked a look around to see how her students were holding up.

The space around Shino had become a huge swarm of flying insects. The bandits were trying very hard to stay away from the insect swarm without much success. It had been a while since Kurenai had seen an Aburame cut loose and a swirling mass of stinging, biting death was as intimidating now as it ever was. There were a handful of bandits dispatched by Shino and weather they were unconscious from chakra drain or some kind of insect poison Kurenai did not know. Since most bandits were _fleeing _from Shino she didn't think she had much to worry about his safety.

Kurenai saw another group of six men try to run behind a wagon and come around and flank the group of soldiers. She Shushin-no-Jutsu to them and cut them all down before they even realized she was there. With some annoyance Kurenai felt hot blood splash across her face. She really did not like getting dirty any more than she had to.

With some breathing room she looked around again and quickly spotted Kiba. The other boy seemed to be playing it smart, and thankfully wasn't trying to be a hero. Since he realized most of the fighting had centered around the group of soldiers and that's what the bandits were mainly focused on, Kiba had made his way to the outskirts of the fight. He would dash in and bash a few heads. When a large group of men would eventually turn their attention to him he would dash out and circle around the bandits to engage the large mass of bodies from another angle. Kurenai was proud to see that he was very efficiently putting down large numbers of bandits while minimizing the risk to himself. The crowd was so focused on overwhelming the soldiers that as a whole it did not notice it was being picked off from the outskirts. There were never enough men with their attention on Kiba to risk overwhelming him.

The Inuzuka, while he acted like the biggest fool (and probably was) in the team, Kurenai was starting to think had the best tactical mind out of all of them.

That just left Hinata. Kurenai had to pause and deal with another five men before she could turn to look for her.

What she saw of her female genin made her frown.

The girl was fighting in the middle of a horde of men who were trying to overwhelm her by sheer numbers. What made her frown was where Hinata found herself. Instead of getting some distance or putting something safe at her back she was instead wading _into_ a large group of men. The girl moved like water and it was hard not to be a little impressed by her fluid Juken style taijutsu. But she was getting careless with her positioning, losing herself in the battle and not thinking. The girl had literally let herself be surrounded by men on all sides and to Kurenai it seemed the girl did not even realize what a terrible tactical blunder she had made. Even if they were only bandits, a genin in that position would have a very high chance of eventually getting hit by the untrained men.

The girl wasn't even looking for a way out. She was holding her own but had completely lost herself to the melee and had zero tactical awareness. Kurenai readied a kunai in each hand. She was going to have to go bail her student out.

Suddenly, Kurenai detected a spike of chakra high in the treeline from where the bandits had come from. Kurenai reacted on instinct and tossed herself to the side as a bolt of electricity shot out from the trees in her direction. The electric lightning struck the ground where she had been standing a moment before, detonating in an explosion that tossed the Jounin to the ground. Kurenai, struggling to her feet, moved as quickly as she could to cover behind one of the wagons between her and the treeline.

"Shinobi? What is a shinobi doing working with a gang of filthy bandits?" Kurenai muttered to herself while she waited for the ringing in her ears to subside. That had been a high level lightning jutsu. If that had hit her she would have been at least seriously injured, which all the way out here in the wilderness meant as good as dead. Kurenai cursed. There was no way she was going to be able to protect the soldiers, keep her students safe and take on this mysterious shinobi suddenly slinging Jounin-level jutsus from a tree behind the tree line all at the same time.

As if on cue Kurenai's sensitive ears picked a high pitched scream amongst all the chaos. Kurenai quickly looked around the corner of the wagon towards Hinata. In an instant her blood went cold. One of the bandits had caught Hinata with a blade and Kurenai saw her fall out of sight below a wall of bloodthirsty men.

000

Hinata was scared and exhilarated all at the same time. All around her were men trying to stab her with every kind of cheap rusty weapon you could think of. She lost herself to her training like she had been taught to do, and lashed out at whoever came near her.

One man swung a sword in front and another tried to stab her with a knife from behind. Hinata sidestepped, grabbed the hand of the man with the sword and guided him into shove it in to the knife bandit's shoulder. Three men then attacked her, two with clubs and one with a kama. She stepped to the side and let two of them crash in to each other and she hit the third man in the throat, dropping him while he struggled for breath. The tenketsu she had closed would make him feel weak and out of breath for at least an hour.

While Hinata did feel some fear as she fought, it mostly came from the new experience of having people actually trying to kill her. She did not feel like she could lose. The men were absolutely terrible fighters. When several of them attacked at once, more often than not with a bit of movement they just got in each other's way. At least twice that she had seen they had stabbed each other when they swung to hit her. Absently she noted that the circle around her that was getting tighter and tighter leaving her with less room to maneuver. She was so deep into her fighting headspace that she did not even think of it as especially significant.

A few moments later Hinata heard something like an explosion coming from where she knew the caravan was. Through the fighting she tried to take a look at what it was. She got a look at Kurenai-sensei rolling away from something and getting behind cover.

The momentary distraction was enough to weaken her concentration on the men she was fighting. She saw a sword coming at her neck and reacted a hair later than she should have, hastily backpedalling away from the blow. This left her somewhat off balance as five men in the mob surrounding her came at her at once. Hinata dodged two of the blades, deflected a third and injured the fourth man's lung with with a Juken strike. She wasn't able to entirely avoid the fifth attacker.

The fifth man thrust at her with a spear. Hinata tried to move out of the way but the blade still bit deep in to the meat of her shoulder. The young genin cried out at the sudden and unexpected pain. The force of the blow and the surprising burning in her arm drove the girl to one knee.

Hinata looked around with her Byakugan and suddenly realized what a stupid mistake she had made. She had allowed herself to surrounded on all sides and that was the _last_ thing you wanted to do when fighting multiple opponents. There were now at least twenty men who had their attention on her and were trying to rush in even now and finish her off. Hinata felt a cold weight in her stomach settle as she realized that now that she was injured there was a real chance she would not walk away from this fight. As the men crowded around her tightly and the weapons began to swing at her again, Hinata couldn't help but wish she could do Kaiten like her father could.

The young girl got to her feet just at the same spear that had gotten her in the arm was stabbing at her again. She spun and parried the blow, but at the same time four more weapons were coming down on her. The genin now barely had a few feet of space now to work with and dodge. Hinata avoided all of them and incapacitated two more men, but one of the blades left a shallow wound on the back of her hand. The next round of attacks was even closer, and another bandit managed a cut on her leg that began to bleed freely. She was going to get overwhelmed merely by mass of numbers and press of bodies leaving her nowhere to dodge. A part of Hinata wondered if this was the end for her, if this was where she was going to die.

All of a sudden the bandits on one side of her started to scatter and get distracted, turning their attention from her and looking behind them. That momentary distraction was all the opening she needed. She rushed at the few men who had suddenly turned their attention away from her. Hinata jumped up put her foot on a startled bandit's shoulder. He gave a startled yelp as Hinata used him as a springboard to jump over the throng of men.

As she landed she looked and saw who had drawn some of the bandit's attention and saved her neck. "Shino!" she cried out in relief.

Hinata had never seen him like this. His kikaichu were swarming all around him like a great black cloud, jumping on anyone foolish enough to get close to him. Most men were running away from him and the few brave enough regretted it as swarming biting insects clogged up their noses, mouths ears and eyes. Those that were not overcome by that soon had their chakra drained and fell unconscious. He had never cut loose like this in any of their training sessions.

"Hinata, are you all right?" he called out to her.

Hinata nodded. The worst of her injuries was her arm where the spear had gotten her, but after training with Anko for over a month such a wound would only be a minor distraction. She got injured worse in training almost every single day.

She stood up and put weight on her wounded leg. It felt a little wobbly but it was still strong. Standing close to Shino the bandits kept their distance buying the two of them a few free moments.

"What was that explosion earlier Shino? Is Kurenai-sensei ok?" asked Hinata while she dug a fresh weapon out of her thigh holster.

"I do not know. From what little I saw in my peripheral vision, it looked like it could have been a lightning or fire jutsu" Shino replied.

Hinata and Shino both felt a sharp spike of chakra an instant before an attack that looked like a small lightning bolt shot out from high in the tree line. It slammed in to the middle of the formation of soldiers that were defending the caravan. Five of them went flying from the explosive force of the jutsu.

Shino and Hinata both looked at the site of the impact, both of them momentarily frozen from the shock.

The shouting voice of Kurenai-sensei reached their ears over the sounds of battle. "You three, take cover behind the wagons and back up the soldiers! I'm going after that shinobi!"

Hinata and Shino exchanged a quick look before they started running to do as their instructor commanded. They had almost made their way to the wagons and the fighting soldiers when a loud horn blew from behind tree line.

All at once, those bandits that could still move began to retreat. There were not that many of them left. The remaining soldiers looked like they wanted to pursue but fear of the mysterious attack from the tree line held them back.

As they were fleeing Shino and Hinata both managed to snag and take down a couple of bandits each. Still the majority that turned to flee got away and returned to the woods.

"Don't pursue. Let them go" called out their Jounin-sensei.

Hinata and the two others on her team hurried over to their sensei. Her face was stoic, blank and hiding anything she might be feeling.

Kurenai gave them each a once over to see if any of them were wounded. They were all at least lightly injured, Hinata being the worst by far, but apparently it wasn't serious enough to merit Kurenai's concern at the moment. "You three there is some rope in the back of the first wagon. Grab it and secure whoever is still alive. We'll need to question them. Be quick about it, I'll do what I can for the wounded."

The Jounin seemed a bit agitated, and her bruske and sharp tone were completely different from what the three genin were used to. They all looked at each other, bloody and bruised but not too the worse for wear. Then they turned around and got to work.

They talked amongst themselves and it was decided the two boys would go about trying up those who were obviously alive while Hinata would make sure those who were not moving were in fact dead and not just pretending or unconscious.

Hinata was shocked at the devastation they had caused. She wasn't sure exactly how many men attacked them, but the number who had retreated had been far smaller than the number that came to attack them. There were sixty four men on the final count – bandits – who were down and scattered all around them. About half of them had been killed. There were many more who to Hinata's inexperienced eyes it seemed like they would not survive their injuries out here about half a day from the nearest town.

The girl had never seen a dead body that she could clearly remember. The smell was the worst. In one of the least flattering things that happened upon death, people lose control of their bowels and many end up soiling themselves. It was undignified and made checking for pulses on the dead bodies even more revolting. The sight of so many dead made something inside the girl start to panic and scream incoherently. It wasn't long before nausea overtook her and she stumbled off the side and vomited.

She lay there sunk on her knees, trying to slow her breathing down. The girl wasn't sure how much time had passed before she felt a hand on her shoulder.

"Hey," asked Kiba with a worried expression on his face, "how you holding up?"

Hinata looked up at him and he seemed composed and concerned for her. This made Hinata feel guilty and ashamed of her own behavior. Her father would be embarrassed by her lack of composure. By her shaming herself and vomiting in front of others. Why couldn't she keep it together like Kiba?

"Hinata?" he asked again, a little more concern in his voice this time.

"I… I've never seen so many dead people" she said. "I'm sorr… I'm just. I'm n-not handling it well. I-I'm not used to this s-sort of thing."

Kiba nodded in understanding, a dark grim expression coming over his face for a moment that he couldn't conceal.

"What's wrong Kiba?" she asked, instantly regretting what a dumb question it was. What wasn't wrong? They were in a field of dead people.

"It's nothing" he said stubbornly, giving her shoulder a reassuring squeeze.

There was a moment of silence, neither genin knowing what to say. Finally Hinata broke the silence.

"Kiba… d-did you kill anybody?" she asked.

Kiba's expression darkened again. "Yeah… at least a couple that I'm sure of. I tried not to but you know… the training takes over. I couldn't avoid it. I think some of them might have gotten me if I'd held back."

Hinata just nodded, feeling bad for the boy but not knowing what to say to make him feel better. The girl was sure that she had not killed anyone. As a Hyuuga she's fortunate that even in a life or death situation the Juken allows one to fight without having to kill. Most other shinobi did not have that luxury. The techniques they trained in were meant to kill and it was crippling to try to fight and not be lethal at the same time.

Here she was, a mess on the ground at just looking at dead people. Here was her teammate who had had to kill for the first time and he was holding it together enough to try and reassure _her_. How pathetic was she?

Hinata wiped her mouth and shakily got to her feet. She turned to Kiba and tried to put as much emphasis as she could on her voice. "It wasn't you fault Kiba. You… You did what you had to do. It's ok."

The boy wouldn't meet her eyes, and looked away at the ground.

"Yeah. I guess" said Kiba.

Hinata just nodded. She hoped that Kurenai-sensei would know what to say to make Kiba feel better. They had been taught at the academy that all shinobi had it rough the first time they killed somebody. They had been taught that they should remember that it was necessary for the success of the mission and the security of the village. Looking around at all the dead people around them, suddenly those things weren't so comforting as they were meant to be.

"Come on," she said, taking Kiba by the arm, "let's just get this done ok? We'll worry about that other stuff later."

"Yeah… you're right. Yeah. Thanks Hinata. Let's just get this done and over with" he said, with a ghost of his cocky toothy grin coming back to his lips.

"Ok" She replied. Her own smile felt equally underwhelming but she knew it was there.

Hinata managed to finish checking all those who were not moving to see if they were dead or just unconscious while the two boys finished tying everyone else up.

000

Kurenai pinched the bridge of her nose. She had another migraine, her first in almost a week. This mission was not going as smoothly as planned.

Of the twenty professional soldiers hired with the caravan had five dead and four wounded. They gave a lot better than they got. Kurenai estimated they took down at least twenty bandits. If it hadn't been for thee wounded and two dead from that lightning jutsu they would have done even better. They were surprisingly disciplined, for non shinobi. The woman now stood before Fujita the captain of the troop of soldiers.

"Captain Fujita," she began "I just got done interrogating some of the bandits. Things are worse than we imagined I'm afraid."

Fujita was a large man of about forty with a scarred and weather beaten face. He was tough and he seemed competent. Thankfully the man was smart enough not to make an issue taking orders from and deferring to a woman. Civilian soldiers that lasted long enough learned that Shinobi were dramatically stronger than they ever would be, the Jounins even more so.

"Well then Kurenai-san, don't beat around the bush. What are we facing here?" Fujita asked.

"According to five different prisoners I questioned your estimates of the size of the band of bandits was wrong. They total not 300 but a little over 400. Today they brought only about half their number because they didn't think a larger number would be able to remain hidden in ambush" said the Jounin.

"Half? But there were about a hundred men that attacked today, not two hundred. Maybe the stupid cretins can't count" replied the captain.

"Actually there were about two hundred hiding in the brush behind the tree line. I used a genjutsu – a ninja technique – to put about half of them in a heavy sleep that should have lasted several hours before the fight started."

It was comical how the captain's eyes seemed to almost bulge out of his head at hearing what numbers they could have faced and at hearing the power a Jounin had. Kurenai allowed herself a small smile at his reaction.

"So what went wrong? You said 'should have lasted'. We got more trouble?" Asked the captain with a grim look.

Kurenai's face darkened. "Yeah, that's the other part of the problem and possibly a bigger one than an extra hundred bandits living out in the woods. Apparently the one who pulled all these men together and is holding them together as a single unit is a Shinobi. According to the prisoners there are two of them, the leader and a younger one who seems to be his subordinate. I know for a fact one of those Shinobi was leading the attack. He was the one who broke my genjutsu on his men, and after the few minutes it took him to do that he started slinging Jutsus at us before calling the retreat."

The captain shifted from foot to foot uncomfortably. "Not to question your competence or the like Kurenai-san, but even with you here we were at a disadvantage. If he woke all those men up he should have ordered them to attack. They would have stood a darn good chance of overwhelming us, even with you here."

Kurenai shook her head. "You underestimate shinobi. Even with another hundred men attacking there was no guarantee of victory. There were four of us shinobi that he could see and only one of him. Four shinobi whose strengths and abilities he had no idea of and was unprepared to deal with. The shinobi leading this group was also the subordinate, not the leader. Even though he has an impressive jutsu the reason he only attacked us with it twice is likely because he has a limit of how many times he can use that technique in a day before being completely exhausted. After that he would have had to duke it out against four unknowns, one of us clearly a Jounin. Calling the retreat was definitely the best move for him."

The captain was silent for a minute, head bowed in thought. Then he asked, "Do you think these bandits will strike again?"

"Unfortunately, there is no way to tell for sure," said the Jounin. "We don't know the level of these shinobi, and that is by and far the most dangerous X factor here. If they are only chunnin level or below they will hesitate to attack a Joinin and may decide to wait for easier pickings. If the shinobi are bold or strong enough however… they may attempt swarming us with the entirety of their band of cutthroats. To be honest Captain, a head on fight against three hundred of these miscreants plus two unknown shinobi would be a losing proposition for us. I don't see how we can hold out against those odds if we play our cards the way we did today."

The Captain nodded grimly. "Aye. There are scarcely a dozen of us fit for duty now after today's attack. I don't know how effective we'll be against the kinds of numbers you're talking about."

"For what it's worth Captain, my gut tells me we haven't seen the last of these animals. We'll try to come up with some strategy to deal with their numbers." And by we, Kurenai thought, it meant she would have to think of a way out of this bloody mess somehow. There was a reason many shinobi avoided being team leaders as much as possible.

Captain Fujita nodded, taking her at her word. "All right then. Well that just leaves us with one outstanding piece of business. We've got thirty four live prisoners after the count is all said and done, many of them wounded. What should we do with them Jounin-san?" asked the Captain. It was times like this he was glad somebody else was in charge as the female Jounin was in charge of the caravan's security.

Kurenai's expression turned hard and dark. " We're over half a day from the nearest town. We'll have to camp overnight before we reach there. We have neither the resources nor the manpower to keep this many prisoner compliant and secure before we reach the town."

"So what should we do?" asked the Captain.

"Have your men kill them all Captain," said Kurenai with a flint hard look in her eyes, "we can't take them with us and we can't have any of this scum getting away and reporting to their boss."

The Captain saluted crisply with a fist to his heart. "It will be done" he said. The veteran turned on his heels and went to issue out her order.

Kurenai turned away, hiding a pained look on her face. She had killed before, and she had known as a Jounin she might be called to make this type of decision. But ordering the death of prisoners didn't sit well with her not in the least. But it was the right decision. Trying to take them along was too big a risk. Kurenai squared her shoulders and went to find her students. She did not want them around when the killing started.

This had all gone to hell. She thought her students would get to beat up a handful of bandits and get some experience in the field. Instead they were witness to an absolute bloodbath and she was sure at least some of them had killed for the first time today. Now with executing these prisoners she was worried about how her students would take it. Best they were away and didn't find out about it until much later.

It wasn't long until she found the three of them. They were sitting and standing next to the wagon furthest to the front. They were not acting like shinobi should… they all had the look of someone who had undergone shellshock. She would have to make time to talk to them tonight. Even Shino seemed conflicted and uncomfortable even through his high collar and glasses.

"I need you three to scout ahead," Kurenai said as she approached the group in a gentle voice. "Don't engage and stay out of sight. Just go see if there are any more surprises waiting for us. The caravan will be underway soon. Double back and catch up to us by nightfall."

The three genin got to their feet and nodded their consent. Without a word they shuffled off. Kurenai started having second thoughts about sending them off by themselves. In their current state, exhaustion and mental shock they might make mistakes that would get them in trouble. But they were a team that specialized in recon… Kurenai reasoned that between Kiba's nose, Shino's bugs and Hintata's Byakugan they would be able to spot trouble well before it found them.

A minute after they were gone, Kurenai began to hear the yelling and begging as the prisoners realized what was about to happen to them. She had given the order. Even though she didn't want to she strode over to where the prisoners were being executed. If she had to order the death of all these people, the least she could do was watch it happen.

000

It was nighttime and Shino, Hinata and Kurenai were sitting around a small campfire. They sat in silence eating their rations without much enthusiasm. Kiba was off taking the first watch of the night.

Shino had killed that afternoon for the first time just like his teammate Kiba. He had killed at least four people. And while it did not sit well with him he was better able to compartmentalize his doubts and the painful twisting inside and put it aside until another more appropriate time to deal with it.

Shino then was able to maintain his observation and analytical skills more or less intact after the experience while his teammates seemed to be experiencing some kind of post traumatic shock. So he was the first to notice after they had come back to camp that the prisoners they had tied up were nowhere to be found.

"Kurenai-sensei… what happened to the prisoners?" asked Shino without preamble.

Kurenai hesitated before answering. "We couldn't secure that many prisoners safely, and we couldn't risk them getting away and reuniting with the larger group."

Shino gave Kurenai a hard look as understanding dawned on him, but Hinata still looked confused.

"What? What does that mean?" the girl asked.

"It means Kurenai-sensei decided to kill over thirty unarmed prisoners Hinata" said Shino with anger in his voice.

Hinata looked confused for a moment before her eyes widened and she looked over at Kurenai, a questioning look in her eyes.

"Is that true Kurenai-sensei?" she asked, looking a little pale.

Kurenai tried not to sigh. She had known this conversation was coming but she had not been looking forward to it. "I gave the order for the prisoners to be executed, yes. It would have been extremely difficult and impractical to take them with us. Not to mention dangerous. We're in a precarious situation out here. We couldn't afford the liability."

"Difficult and impractical… but not impossible" said Shino with an accusing tone in his voice.

Kurenai's tone took a hard edge to it. "My main priorities are the successful completion of this mission and the survival of every member of this team. If that means having to kill a bunch of murdering bandits in cold blood then that is what I am going to do. This isn't me trying to be callous, this is the duty of every shinobi. Sparing the lives of our enemies is a luxury and one that in this case we could not afford to take."

There was an awkward silence that followed. Shino's resentment could be felt rolling off in waves off him. He really didn't like how things had gone down. But for whatever reason he kept his mouth closed and did not argue the point further.

"Now then," began Kurenai after a few moments, "we need to discuss what we're going to do from now on."

"Kurenai-sensei," began Hinata, "should we abandon the mission? Or send for reinforcements? These large numbers of bandits, plus two uknown shinobi… it seems l-like a lot of us to handle."

This time Kurenai did audibly sigh. The girl had a point but it wasn't so simple as that. Since this had proven itself to be at least B-Rank, and possibly even A-Rank mision depending on the skill of the shinobi that were leading the bandits, it was within her authority to pull the plug on the mission if she judged it to be in the best interests of Konoha. In most cases that would mean making the judgment that the risk to the lives of promising young genin was too great, the chances of success were too low, and the drawback to the village of abandoning the mission was an acceptable loss given the unexpected circumstances.

However it was also true that without the success of this trading expedition the economy out here in far eastern land of fire would be hard hit. Though most shinobi didn't think about this, the fact was that ninja villages had to worry as much about politics and economics as they did about missions and military power. Failing this mission and allowing these wagons to be ransacked could have a great many indirect detrimental effects on the land of fire and by extension Konoha.

For example, if the situation got bad enough the fire lord may be forced to send some military aid to the area. Or konoha would have to send out another mission to wipe out the bandits… but it would foster a lot of ill will if they allowed the livelihood of these border towns to be crippled and indirectly undermine the authority of the fire lord near the border and trust in konoha. In short she couldn't just abandon this mission without the possibility of some serious consequences.

"No Hinata, we're not abandoning the mission. And there is no time to send for backup. We're going to neutralize this threat to the border towns. We won't abandon this mission unless we have no other choice" said the red eyed Jounin.

"So what is the plan?" asked Shino, seeming to be back to his usual controlled self.

"We can't just continue on with the caravan route waiting to get ambushed again. We have to assume the shinobi will try to take the caravan again, this time with every single bandit they can muster. Since they are far more mobile they can set up a far more dangerous ambush further along the route. We really have no choice. If we want to have the best chance of success we need to go after them in the forest and take the offensive" said Kurenai.

Hinata gulped nervously and Shino said nothing. "Kurenai-sensei… y-you r-re-really want us t-to fight t-three hundred bandits and t-t-two shinobi?" asked Hinata. To Kurenai it seemed when she was nervous or scared Hinata's nervous stutter began to act up.

The Jounin shook her head. "No, no we are facing a superior force. Our best bet is to use your strengths and scout them out. We'll have to make an opportunity and take down the two shinobi. That will be the equivalent of cutting off the head of the serpent. Without a charismatic leader who can bully them to stay in line a group of bandits like this will soon break up and go back to becoming the manageable nuisances they were before. Our goal will be to find these two shinobi and neutralize them."

"Tomorrow morning," Kurenai continued "we will arrive at the first town in on the caravan's trading trip. They should be safe enough behind the walls of that town. We will enter the woods and head to where the captured bandits told us their camp was located. We will scout the situation make plans to engage the two ninja without having to engage all the thugs at the same time. If all goes well we should be able to catch them by surprise."

000


End file.
